


Never mind your bleeding heart

by numot94 (futureplans)



Category: Red Velvet (K-pop Band)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-01
Updated: 2018-12-15
Packaged: 2019-09-05 02:07:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 32,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16801555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/futureplans/pseuds/numot94
Summary: The first time Seungwan saw Joohyun, she’d just turned 13 and the older girl was 14, a few weeks away from her birthday. She fell in love instantly.





	1. You're like a party somebody threw me

The first time Seungwan saw Joohyun, she’d just turned 13 and the older girl was 14, a few weeks away from her birthday.

She’d accompanied Seulgi and her parents to the train station, lured by the promise of an ice cream from the station’s ice cream parlour, a rare treat that she couldn’t pass up. The train arrived as all four of them stood on the platform, the two young girls licking their cones happily in spite of the cold weather and so pleased with the sweets that they could only pay a fraction of their attention to the thought of the older girl who would be living with Seulgi’s family while she attended high school.

And then she stepped down from the train carriage, right in front of them, and it was like the world had tilted on its axis. Seungwan stood by, mouth agape and ice cream forgotten as the girl bowed and introduced herself, reddening unmistakeably at her own southern dialect. Seulgi’s parents received her with warm smiles, dispensing all formalities and drawing her into a hug, and still Seungwan could only stare, ears fuzzy and filled with static as the ice cream melted and dripped over her hands.

They walked back to the car, the older girl ahead with Seulgi’s parents and Seungwan lagging behind with Seulgi. She leaned closer to her friend, absently patting her sticky hand with a napkin. “What was her name, again?”, she asked in her best attempt at nonchalance, ignoring the way her heart beat erratically. Seulgi looked at her strangely, so she scrambled for an excuse. “Her voice is so low, I couldn’t hear”

This earned her a chuckle, which probably meant she was off the hook. “Yeah, I think she’s a little embarrassed. Whenever we visited her in Daegu she was much louder”, she commented thoughtfully, and Seungwan greedily took in every word, even if Seulgi seemed to have forgotten the original question.

“And… her name?”, she requested again, trying hard to give her usual exasperated smile at Seulgi’s oblivious nature when the smile that was really growing inside her was one of pure awe and a strange sort of happiness she’d never felt before.

“Oh. Right”, Seulgi replied sheepishly. “That’s Joohyun-unnie. She’s really cool, I think you’ll like her”, she added. Seungwan nodded and returned her attention to her ice cream in order to finish it before they got in Mr. Kang’s car.

Inside, Seulgi sat in the middle, with Joohyun to her right and Seungwan to her left. Seungwan spent the entire ride in thoughtful silence, looking out of the window and considering the way everything seemed to have changed.

Joohyun. That was her name. It was as pretty as her. And she was just so pretty. She had the face of an angel, perfect and warm and bright. When she gave one of her small smiles, it lit up her features so that she looked truly divine, otherworldly. Even her voice was beautiful, her tones soft and measured, her laughter the most harmonious melody.

That car ride was all it took. By the time she stepped into Seulgi’s home, sticky hands uselessly dangling by her side as Mr. Kang helped Joohyun with her bags, she knew she was deeply and unshakeably in love.

She sat on the sofa as the couple ushered Joohyun upstairs to show her her room. She tapped her fingers against her thighs as her mind reeled. She was in love. The thought made her giddy, brought a dumb smile to her face. She couldn’t help her overwhelming happiness, the way every colour seemed a little brighter and every sound a little clearer. Suddenly, the world was filled with beauty, and it was all because of Joohyun. She was in everything around Seungwan, the very fabric of the universe. She was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to her. Falling in love was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to Seungwan.

(…)

Nobody knew. She was well aware of how people would react if she told them. She was a girl, in love with a girl. People wouldn’t like it, or even worse, they wouldn’t believe it. So she kept it to herself, her well-kept secret.

It wasn’t a shameful secret. It didn’t pain her to keep it to herself. In truth, it just felt like she’d found something that was all her own, a precious little gem that nobody else would ever see or covet. At night, she’d go to sleep lulled by memories of every little gesture, every word Joohyun spoke to her, and it felt special to know that these thoughts were all hers.

There was only one person she wanted to tell. So, on their next sleepover, she waited until Seulgi had turned off the lights before whispering into the dark room. “Seulgi? Can I tell you a secret?”

“Of course, Wannie”, was the immediate response, tinged in equal parts by curiosity and concern. “what is it?”, her friend added, after a pause where Seungwan wanted to say something but felt the words stick to her throat unexpectedly.

“I…”, she finally managed to say, hands fidgeting with the bedsheets as she stared hard at the dark ceiling. “I like Joohyun-ssi”, she whispered at last. The words escaped her like air out of a deflating balloon, rushing out and leaving a sort of dizziness behind. She felt strangely nervous as she awaited Seulgi’s response.

“Well, yeah”, she said after a moment, sounding a little confused at the confession. “I like her too, she’s super nice and –“

“No, I don’t mean like that”, Seungwan clarified, her nerves only growing even as giddiness grew inside her in equal measures. “I mean I like-like her. I think she’s the prettiest person I’ve ever seen”

“Me too!”, Seulgi replied with enthusiasm, a heavy rustling suggesting that she was turning to face Seungwan in the near-darkness. “The first time I saw her, I couldn’t believe how pretty she was!”

Seungwan sighed at her friend’s obliviousness, a little embarrassed at having to spell it out so clearly. “Seulgi, I like her like you’re supposed to like boys”, she mumbled self-consciously. She didn’t like the way it made it sound like liking Joohyun was somehow worse than liking boys.

“Oh”, Seulgi replied, dragging out the syllable as Seungwan’s words slowly sank in. “So does that mean you like girls and not boys?”, she asked curiously.

“I don’t know”, she answered truthfully. “I just know I like Joohyun-ssi”, she added with a shrug that Seulgi couldn’t see. In the darkness, there was no need to hide the smile that had spread itself across her face, her lips tugged up irresistibly at the thought of her feelings for Joohyun.

“I never liked anyone”, Seulgi mused, the bed creaking as she got up and joined Seungwan under her covers. “What is it like?” Her voice was even lower now that they were so close together, the way they always ended up when they intended to talk for hours and didn’t want to wake up their parents. Seungwan’s smile grew even wider as relief spread through her, only then realizing how worried she’d been about Seulgi’s reaction.

“It’s like…”, she started hesitantly. “It’s like, whenever I see her, all the breath gets knocked out of me and I can’t stop smiling. It’s like there’s butterflies flying around in my stomach and making me feel all ticklish and jittery and all I can think, all the time, is that I like her so much and she’s so nice and… When she smiles, it’s like a second sun, but way brighter and way warmer and so special because the sun shines down on everyone but only a few people ever get to see that smile” She paused, cutting herself off despite knowing that she could keep talking about it for hours.

“Wow”, Seulgi remarked with awe. “That sounds great. I can’t wait to like someone too” Seungwan sighed happily at her words, the joy inside her seeming to fill every crevice and still overflow.

“I’m so lucky”, she whispered so softly that the words barely carried across the inches that separated their faces. “I’m so lucky that she’s right here and I get to see her whenever I want”

(…)

Spring arrived, and with it the flowers that filled every tree and bush with colour. Seungwan loved walking to and from school, breathing in deeply to capture all the scents that spread through the streets. Seulgi, just as pleased by the sights and smells, was happy to follow along as she picked absurdly long routes on their way home, stretching out the walk as much as possible.

They skipped more than walked, ignoring the looks they received from tired men and women in suits, shuffling elderly folks and women struggling with shopping backs as they pushed baby strollers down the street. They turned the corner into a road lined by cherry blossom trees, the sidewalks tinged a light pink by the carpet of flowers that had fallen on them.

Without having to share a word, they linked arms and raced down the road, giggling as their footsteps disturbed the peaceful array of flowers and sent flecks of white and pink fluttering in the air. Just as they were leaving the shade of the half-naked trees, Seulgi tugged Seungwan back, crouching down to gather handfuls of the blossoms and quickly springing up to throw them into the air, so that they were surrounded by a shower of petals.

“Let’s only walk on the flower path”, she declared grandly, throwing them both into another giggling fit. As soon as Seungwan had recovered her breath, she leaned down to return the favour, the two engaging in a battle of flowers that ended up with both of them covered in pink from head to toe.

They were only a few blocks away from home, so they hurried back, leaving a trail of cherry blossoms behind them. When they finally burst through the door of Seulgi’s home, they could hear the TV from the living room, letting them know that Joohyun had arrived before them. It was turned off and, in a few steps, the older girl had joined them by the front door.

Joohyun had been around for about two months now, and she’d become a little more relaxed about her speech, the Daegu dialect a little faded as she grew closer to a Seoul accent every day. In spite of this, she remained soft-spoken and her words were spare, so that every single one was engraved in Seungwan’s mind in perfect relief.

She never stopped being stunned at the sight of the older girl, heart racing every time Joohyun entered the room, so that she hadn’t yet managed to say a single thing to her. This time, as usual, she froze in place and watched as Joohyun approached, remaining still even as Seulgi bent down to remove her shoes.

“There you are, you took your time today”, Joohyun called out as she entered the corridor, but her friendly chastising died down as she took a good look at them. With bright eyes that seemed to sparkle with youthful energy, she stepped even closer to the pair and reached out for Seungwan’s cheek, causing her to clench her fists tightly and watch the approaching hand with held breath.

The hand disappeared in her hair and returned holding a small pink bud, which Joohyun examined happily. “Oh, you went walking under the cherry blossom trees”, she remarked with a dreamy voice. “You two certainly are a romantic pair”, she added with a wink that nearly stopped Seungwan’s heart.

As Seulgi straightened up, shoes neatly put away, Seungwan finally remembered that she should do the same, and she avoided Joohyun’s unnerving gaze in favour of untying her shoelaces.

“What about you, unnie?”, she heard Seulgi say from her side. “Will you be walking there with your boyfriend?” Of course she would be, Seungwan thought simply as she slowly undid the knots with hands that were still shaking from her proximity to Joohyun. The older girl was beautiful and perfect in every way, all the boys would surely be throwing themselves at her feet.

“Oh, I don’t have time for boyfriends”, Joohyun replied with a chuckle. Seungwan’s hands froze on the laces for a second, confusion hitting her at full speed, but she quickly caught herself and resumed her actions as naturally as possible. Even as she stared at the tips of her shoes, fireworks erupted in her chest, the source of such blistering happiness hard to divine.

Before she could think it through, she was shoeless and standing alone with Joohyun, Seulgi already disappearing into the living room. She stepped forward to follow her, her nerves instantly multiplying tenfold without the soothing presence of her best friend, but she was stopped by Joohyun’s direct command.

“Wait”, she ordered in her sweet, gently voice. Seungwan immediately stopped and looked up at her with wide eyes, heart beating so loudly that she was sure the older girl could hear it. “You still have some flowers in your hair. Let me fix it before you go in or they’ll get all over the floor”

Without pause, Joohyun’s hands returned to her hair, brushing through stray strands as she collected the blossoms to throw away. Seungwan desperately wanted to say something, but she felt so dizzy that she feared she’d fall over right there in the entrance hall.

“S-sorry, Joohyun-ssi”, she managed to stutter out, her heart beating so hard that she could barely breathe. Joohyun stopped her actions and leaned backwards slightly, studying her with a pleased expression, and only then did Seungwan realize it was the first thing she’d ever said to her.

She was sure the older girl would make the usual teasing comment about how it turned out Seungwan could talk after all, but all she did was smile gently. “You can call me unnie”, she said warmly, returning to the careful cleaning of Seungwan’s hair.

She felt her cheeks grow impossibly warm and she took a deep breath, the smell of Joohyun’s shampoo flooding her senses and managing to calm her down slightly.

How could it be that Joohyun wasn’t just physically perfect and appealing to every sense, from sight to sound to smell, but also wonderfully sweet and kind? That her touch was so gentle, her eyes so caring, her smile so warm? She truly was an angel, inside and out. Somehow, as impossible as it seemed, Seungwan felt herself falling further, falling so deeply and so quickly that it was a wonder how she remained upright, standing there right in front of Joohyun.

(…)

It wasn’t like she thought she had a chance with Joohyun. Not even her dreams dared to go that far, let alone her hopes. Joohyun was older and so pretty, and in the few months she’d spent at high school she’d already made many friends and gained dozens of admirers, even if she claimed not to have time for a boyfriend.

Seungwan knew she was just a kid and that Joohyun would never even look at her that way. But she truly didn’t mind. She couldn’t even imagine anything beyond admiring the older girl. They were in completely different planes of existence, Seungwan in the boring and mundane and Joohyun in the ethereal and perfect.

Humans wouldn’t think of being with angels, just like Seungwan wouldn’t think of being with Joohyun. She was the moon, pale and weak, coming out as the sun that was Joohyun began to settle over the horizon and treasuring those few seconds of togetherness.

She treasured every second, and she made sure she had as many of those as she could. She spent nearly every afternoon at Seulgi’s home, only leaving for dinner, and sometimes not even then. Now that she’d gotten accustomed to her new classmates, Joohyun would often stay at school or go out with friends, but every once in a while, she’d step through the front door, the unexpectedness of it only adding to the pure pleasure of the event.

Today was one of those occasions, and Joohyun joined them in the living room a few hours before dinnertime, dropping into the empty armchair by the sofa where Seulgi and Seungwan sat. She was in her school uniform, still carrying the purple backpack she’d recently purchased, and there was a calm smile on her face that made Seungwan’s heart flutter like it had turned into a flock of doves when she wasn’t looking.

“Hello, Seulgi-yah, Seungwan-ah. What are you two up to?”, she asked with the detached interest of a high-schooler addressing the kids that Seungwan was well aware they must look like in her eyes.

“Just watching TV”, Seulgi said casually, already used to taking over for Seungwan while she struggled for the most basic of words in Joohyun’s presence. “Do you have a lot of homework, unnie?”

“Don’t even remind me”, Joohyun said with a chuckle, throwing a dark glance at her backpack before her features cleared again. “Did you two finish yours already?” No answer was required when Seulgi’s face immediately scrunched up with guilt, but the older girl just laughed. “Oh, well, I suppose I can cut you a little slack since it’s a Friday”

She settled more comfortably into the chair, checking her phone briefly before stuffing it back into her pocket. Seungwan followed every movement with poorly-concealed reverence, her attention so fully focused on Joohyun’s hand that she barely heard her question. “Seungwan-ah, will you be sleeping over?”, she asked pleasantly, her innocent words making Seungwan’s breath catch at the thought that she even cared enough to ask. She was so lucky.

“Oh, I actually can’t tonight”, she said sadly, feeling a sudden urge to apologize. “I have a thing tomorrow morning so I have to sleep at home”, she explained with excessive nodding, biting into the corner of her lips to avoid smiling too hard as Joohyun looked right into her eyes and smiled gently.

“Oh wow”, the older girl said playfully. “Did you hear that, Seulgi-yah? I guess not everyone spends their Saturday mornings sleeping”, she joked, the amusement only lasting a moment before she was suddenly gloomy. “Maybe I should follow your example and actually try to get some work done tomorrow morning”, she mused unhappily.

“Oh, that’s not – I mean, you always wake up before we do whenever I sleep over, unnie”, Seungwan hurried to reply, hoping to cheer up the older girl. Her thoughts felt scrambled by Joohyun’s attention, so that she barely knew what she was saying.

“That’s because you two stay up talking until dawn and only wake up at lunchtime”, Joohyun replied with a chuckle, checking her phone again and smiling at whatever was on the screen. Seungwan only reddened at her words, not sure whether she should apologize for any noise they’d made, but the older girl was already back on her feet and leaning down to pick up her backpack.

“I’ll go get started on that homework, I guess. Have fun at your thing tomorrow, Seungwan-ah”, she said pleasantly before turning around and heading for the staircase. Seungwan followed her with her eyes, only turning back to Seulgi when her figure disappeared up the stairs.

“Do you think that went okay?”, she immediately asked in a hushed voice.

“I think so, yeah”, Seulgi said thoughtfully. “But she might have thought it was a little weird that you were holding my hand the whole time”

Seungwan stifled a yelp as she looked down to find their fingers firmly entangled, her grip on Seulgi’s hand so tight that her knuckles had gone white. “I told you to tell me when I do that”, she whined childishly, releasing Seulgi’s hand and sliding down the sofa in embarrassment. “Only kids hold hands”, she sighed out, hoping Joohyun might not have noticed. She didn’t ask Seulgi about that, happy to live in the illusion that she hadn’t.

“That’s not true”, Seulgi riposted uncertainly. “High school girls hold hands too, I see it all the time. I bet Joohyun-unnie holds hands with her friends too”, she added with an encouraging smile that did actually help a little.

Seungwan continued to slide down the sofa until she was mostly sitting on the floor, her neck tilted back until she was staring at the ceiling. “Do you think she thought I was doing something cool tomorrow?”, she asked after a pause.

“I don’t think she thought much about it”, Seulgi replied honestly. “She seemed like she was waiting for a text or something”

Seungwan sighed, agreeing with Seulgi’s assessment. “Actually, it’s not something cool. I’m going to the dentist”, she admitted in a hollow voice. “I think he wants me to get braces”

“Oh”, Seulgi said, her tone communicating just the right amount of pity and horror. “I mean, braces aren’t that bad”, she finally added, though the silent pause made it obvious that they clearly were that bad.

She dragged herself back up the sofa, pulling up her legs so that she sat hugging her knees. “It’ll be fine”, she said stoically, gazing straight ahead. “I just can’t come here until I stop drooling on things. I can’t drool in front of Joohyun”, she concluded with an absent nod. Seulgi reached for her hand, which she easily gave up, and they eventually relaxed back into their original positions.

As Seulgi’s focus returned to the TV, Seungwan let her mind drift, going every word Joohyun had said, every smile she’d generously offered. She closed her eyes for an instant, letting the image come to life behind her eyelids. Who cared about braces when she had Joohyun?

(…)

Braces were terrible. They hurt her cheeks and made her too self-conscious to smile too widely. She couldn’t drink soda or chew gum and little pieces of food kept getting stuck in them. Eating lunch became a stressful activity, doing her best not to drool on her food in front of her classmates, who would surely make fun of her for it. At least Seulgi never abandoned her side, even helping shield her from sight.

And the worst part was that she couldn’t see Joohyun. She just couldn’t step foot in that house until her words stopped coming out rough and lisped, barely comprehensible so that she had to repeat herself three times in class before the teacher understood her answers.

Everybody told her that it was only temporary, that it would get better in no time, but until it did she was forced to wallow alone at home, or with Seulgi when she came over, and dream of all the things that she’d been denied because of those stupid braces.

She sighed into her hand, pencil twirling in her fingers as she tried to bring Joohyun’s face to focus in her mind. In her absence, she did her best to keep the image fresh until it could be renewed. The sheer angelical beauty in every inch of Joohyun’s face filled her with a nostalgic mood at the forced separation. If she couldn’t see her, she’d have to capture her vision in some other way.

That was why she sat alone in her room after dinner, half-scribbled sheets of paper spread over her desk as she tried to think of a word that rhymed with onyx, for Joohyun’s black hair. She wanted to write a poem at least half as beautiful as Joohyun herself, but it felt like there weren’t enough words in the world to express it. Maybe if she knew a fancy, romantic language, like French or Italian, it would be different. But with the vocabulary at her disposal she’d never manage it.

She shifted in her seat, reaching for a blank sheet of paper for another attempt, when there was a knock at her door, following by the sound of the doorknob turning as the intruder entered her room without waiting for permission. She hastily shuffled all the paper into a pile and dropped a notebook on it before turning around to face her visitor.

“What’s my little mouse doing up here that’s so much more interesting than spending time with her unnie?”, her older sister asked from the doorframe, amusement colouring her features.

“Don’t call me that”, Seungwan whined weakly, too flustered by the sudden invasion to muster up the usual irritation at the nickname that her mother had used when she’d been younger. Of course her sister would start using it once she’d left for college, happy to remind Seungwan of how she was still a baby to her.

Seunghee walked further into the room, sitting down on Seungwan’s bed and absently playing with a loose thread from the blanket. “So, mum and dad were telling me I’ve been replaced”, she said lightly, ignoring Seungwan’s protest. “You’ve got a new favourite unnie”, she clarified with a teasing smile as she looked up to face her.

Seungwan reddened, mouth immediately opening in protest, but Seunghee beat her to it. “They say you talk about her all the time, Joohyun-unnie this, Joohyun-unnie that”, she commented with a smirk. Seungwan debated throwing her eraser at her to shut her up. “She must be a better woman than me to deal with a brat like you”

She did throw her eraser then, though her sister avoided it easily. “Of course she’s better than you”, she pointed out immediately, then paused before she could start rambling about Joohyun’s perfection. “You suck”, she added instead, although they both knew she didn’t mean it. She just had to say it because they were sisters and she had an image to maintain.

“Aww, my little mouse has a girl crush!”, Seunghee squealed in a delighted voice, jumping up from the bed to wrap her arms around Seungwan. The latter quickly wheeled her chair away from the attack, sparing a panicked glance towards the scraps of poetry that she really hoped her sister wouldn’t notice.

Thankfully, Seunghee was too entertained by her little sister’s embarrassment to pay any attention to the desk. She chased her down until Seungwan was trapped in strong arms, uselessly slapping against them and squirming in place.

“So, tell me everything. How old is this cool unnie?”, Seunghee asked once she’d finally freed Seungwan from her grip. She returned to the bed and patted the empty space by her side, inviting Seungwan to join her, which she reluctantly accepted.

“She’s 15”, Seungwan said simply, unwilling to elaborate when she was sure she’d only be rewarded with more teasing. She scowled at the interrogation, but her sister barely spared her a glance.

“Two years older?”, she scoffed. “That’s barely an unnie! I can’t believe you’d abandon your own flesh and blood over that” She ruffled Seungwan’s hair as she spoke, receiving a frustrated whine in return.

“She’s in high school!”, Seungwan pointed out in a voice so high-pitched from indignation and disbelief that Seunghee grimaced in a dramatic show of pain.

“And I’m in college. College beats high school”, she said with raised eyebrows and another annoying smirk. “But fine, I get it. High school feels like a world away when you’re still a little mouse in middle school”

Seungwan was halfway through an eyeroll when her bedroom door opened yet again, her father’s head poking through. “How is it that I send one daughter up to recover the other and end up with neither?”, he asked with a good-natured smile. Both sisters looked at each other, agreeing in an instant that their conversation would remain between them.

“Wan-ah had a lot of homework to finish, but I’m convincing her to do it tomorrow”, Seunghee said smoothly, ruffling Seungwan’s hair again. It must look like a bird’s nest by this point. “It’s not every day you get to see your busy sister, little mouse”

Her father was quick to agree and, before she knew what had happened, she was sitting in between her parents on the sofa, watching some movie her sister had chosen. For that night, her poetry was forgotten.

(…)

For the first time in Seungwan’s life, she wasn’t looking forward to her summer vacation. It wouldn’t be much more than a month, but instead of feeling like a short glimpse of freedom, it seemed to spread before her endlessly, weeks and weeks without the vaguest hope of seeing Joohyun.

During the school term, it was never guaranteed that she’d cross paths with Joohyun at Seulgi’s home, the older girl increasingly busy with juggling schoolwork and the social life that someone as incredible as her was bound to have. But even then, there was always a chance, no matter how small it might be. A chance that increased when Seungwan stayed over for dinner and grew into a certainty when she spent the night, sure to find Joohyun coming home late at night or lounging around the kitchen early in the morning.

Now, that chance would be hopelessly destroyed, as Joohyun would be spending her summer vacation with her family, back in Daegu, far away from Seungwan. She had never felt so sad, so hopelessly despondent at the future that awaited her.

Seulgi tried her best to cheer her up, reminding her of all the things that they would be able to do in the weeks that they were free from school, and it did help a little, but still the feeling of dread persisted. After months of happiness, to suddenly have it all taken away, the source of the excitement that permanently buzzed through her veins lately, was almost impossible to comprehend.

She sat on Seulgi’s sofa, boneless and limp, arms dropped lifelessly by her sides as her head rested on the back of the sofa, a little tilted to the side. She sighed yet again, a useless attempt to push away the weight that had settled on her chest.

“We can get ice cream every day”, Seulgi rambled excitedly by her side, pausing every now and then to check on her. “Well, not every day, maybe. But every other day, probably, I’ll have to check with my mom” Seungwan’s head tilted further, her body close to flopping over completely and just lying sideways on the sofa, but she hummed to show that she was listening.

“And we can go to the bookstore and check out all their comics”, Seulgi continued, reminding Seungwan of how the boy who worked there during the summer would never bother to chase them off even though they never bought anything. It was nice to be able to go into that air-conditioned place with the comfy pillows in the back and just sit for hours. She sat up a little straighter, earning a brighter smile from Seulgi.

“And my cousin won’t be here, so you can borrow his bike and we can go riding around the city when it’s not too hot”, she carried on, reaching over to loop her arms around one of Seungwan’s and rest her chin on her shoulder, her last resort in cheering her up. Seungwan let the comforting warmth slowly relax her, finally settling back into a more human position with a final sigh.

“We said that last year and then we couldn’t go biking a single day because it was always hot”, she argued without much effort, not really bothered by the possibility of not going on a bike ride. Air-conditioned places were always more appealing anyway.

“Well, now we’re older and our parents will probably let us ride the subway all we want instead of just hanging around our neighbourhood”, her friend insisted, eyes sparkling at the possibility. Seungwan turned to face her, which was a little difficult when she was still perched on her shoulder. “We can go to the mall, or the aquarium, or walk along the river”, she listed with growing excitement. Seungwan smiled at the sight, the weight in her chest almost forgotten.

“Sorry to interrupt”, Joohyun’s voice rang out, tinged with amusement. Seungwan turned to her in a flash, face reddening in embarrassment at how clingy she always was with Seulgi. The exaggerated skinship was something she knew they’d need to tone down when they got to high school, since only kids clung to each other so closely. By the time girls were in high school, only hand-holding and maybe hugging was alright. She didn’t want people to think she was childish and needed her friend like a safety blanket.

“You weren’t interrupting, unnie”, Seulgi said obliviously, shifting away from Seungwan to flash a bright smile at Joohyun. “We were just planning our summer vacations”, she added happily, and Joohyun smiled back, Seulgi’s joy clearly contagious.

“Oh, you must be excited about that”, Joohyun commented casually, not even beginning to suspect how Seungwan felt the exact opposite. Still, she couldn’t deny that a part of her was eager to travel alone on the subway like Seulgi had suggested, free to visit every point in the city without her parents.

“Well, I hate to pull you away from such important plans, Seulgi-yah, but I need your help. Aunt Jiyoung said I could borrow their spare suitcase so I didn’t have to bring the big one, but I’m not sure where they keep it”, she explained, referring to Seulgi’s parents as her aunt and uncle as she always did, despite the absence of blood ties.

Seulgi jumped up to help her, guiding her to her parents’ bedroom while Seungwan remained alone in the living room, wondering if this would be the last time she ever saw Joohyun. She’d been doing it every time she met the older girl lately, even though she was fairly certain that the Kangs would let her accompany Joohyun to the train station.

The last few days of school went by in a flash and suddenly she was sitting in the Kangs’ car, once again staring out the window as Seulgi sat by her side and Joohyun on the opposite end. She felt stupid for feeling the urge to cry, the reaction childishly dramatic, so she bit the inside of her cheek and focused on counting the cars that flew by them on the opposite lane.

A moment later and they’d parked inside the train station, another and they were standing on the platform, watching the digital clock slowly count down the minutes to Joohyun’s train.

And then the train was seconds away and Joohyun already stood with the handle of her suitcase in her hand, looking down the line for any signs of the coming transport until finally it came into view, brakes squealing as it slowed down to a stop, the mechanical voice of the station announcement calling out for any passengers heading to Gwangmyeong.

The Kangs stepped forward to give Joohyun brief hugs, all messages and gifts for her family already taken care of and packed away safely in her suitcase. From the couple, Joohyun turned to Seulgi, who also came closer for her own hug. Seungwan stood by their side, trying with all her might to commit every curve of Joohyun’s face to memory before it would be gone for so long.

She was so focused that she didn’t notice Joohyun approaching until she was right in front of her. She looked up into that beautiful face, breathless at the bright smile that she knew must come from the anticipation of seeing her family again, and nearly choked on a gasp as Joohyun’s arms were suddenly around her, enveloping her in a hug of her own. She hesitantly reached out to return it, touching the older girl’s back lightly, almost reverently, feeling a warmth more comforting than anything she’d ever experienced before.

Hugging Joohyun was as natural as hugging Seulgi, but it was also softer and warmer and infinitely more precious. Absolutely nothing could possibly have the power of cheering her up like that one hug did. In an instant, all her dread melted away, and she was sure that she could go a year without seeing Joohyun as long as she could hold on to the memory of this moment.

She waved at Joohyun as the train sped away, then she followed the Kangs to their car, the warmth of Joohyun’s hug still hanging on her skin, comforting her in the absence of the older girl.

(…)

In the end, the summer didn’t speed by as it usually did, but it also didn’t drag interminably as she’d feared. Seulgi had been right and their parents finally allowed them to travel the city freely, as long as they promised to always answer their phones and be home for lunch and dinner.

In the mornings and the afternoons, however, they were free to explore, starting with taking the subway from one end of the line to the other, then getting out at random stops and running down busy streets, filled with young students enjoying their vacations, bustling shops, confused tourists that held on to oversized maps and even unknown artists and musicians doing impromptu performances.

They found innumerable treasures, from hidden spots in parks where they could sit in the sun for hours without interruptions, to arcades with all their favourite games, and even an ice cream parlour where the owner took a liking to them and sold them everything at half-price.

Each day was so packed with fun activities and hurried running from one spot to another, that Seungwan never quite found the time to miss Joohyun. It was only at night, when she dropped to bed in exhaustion, that thoughts of the older girl sprang to her mind. And then, in those few moments before sleep won her over, she’d think of that hug and a happy smile would spring to her lips, staying there until she was carried away to dreamland.

Week by week, time passed, until she was almost surprised to find that Joohyun would be returning that Friday. From the moment she was informed of Joohyun’s return, however, time suddenly began to move like molasses, so painfully slow that an hour seemed to take an eternity. All at once, every instant of their separation hit her with the full force of the older girl’s absence and she missed her dreadfully, like someone had opened a hole in her chest and pulled out something vital.

Even worse, this time she couldn’t go pick her up at the station because she had another dentist’s appointment. It was only on Saturday that she managed to make her way to Seulgi’s house, shyly ringing the doorbell in the fear and secret hope that Joohyun would answer. To her surprise, that was exactly what happened.

Joohyun seemed taller, or maybe it was just her absence that had shifted her features in Seungwan’s mind. She stood there, pale skin a little less pale and just as beautiful, and slowly a smile grew on her face as she identified the visitor.

“Seungwan-ah? You didn’t come pick me up at the station, I was a little – “, she began teasingly, but was swiftly interrupted by Seungwan springing forwards and capturing her in a clumsy hug, head digging against her shoulder. She started slightly, but soon relaxed and let her arms wrap loosely around the younger girl.

“Did you miss me, then?”, she asked lightly, the amusement in her voice ringing like crystal inside Seungwan’s head. She’d missed her so much, she suddenly realized as she nearly began to cry against the older girl’s shoulder. She nodded, a little embarrassed by her impulsive action and unwilling to pull back and let Joohyun see her flushed face.

They remained in that position, until Joohyun’s hand began to thread softly through Seungwan’s hair. “You’re a cutie, has anyone ever told you that?”, she commented with amused affection, the words bringing a silly smile to Seungwan’s lips. “Now come on, Seulgi-yah must be waiting for you”, she added. Seungwan didn’t have the courage to tell her that it wasn’t Seulgi she’d come to see.

(…)

Three very important things happened that Autumn. The first was on one of the first cold days, when Seungwan walked home arm in arm with Seulgi, seeking a little warmth in her light summer uniform. They took the long way around, the one that Seungwan had discovered passed only a few blocks from the local girls’ high school.

Just as they crossed the street and a stronger gust of wind blew through them, bringing a shiver to Seungwan’s spine, Seulgi stopped in her tracks and pointed excitedly at a nearby convenience store. Seungwan studied it with furrowed brow, wondering if her friend had recognized someone.

“Let’s have ramen!”, Seulgi exclaimed instead, clearly just excited at the thought of the warm food.

“It’s the middle of the afternoon”, Seungwan pointed out doubtfully, squinting at the store’s patrons and finding that most of them were high schoolers, recently freed from classes, probably taking a break before returning for more self-study.

“So? I’m still hungry”, Seulgi replied simply. Seungwan let herself be dragged along, which was always easier than trying to talk a hungry Seulgi out of eating. They entered the store, only slightly embarrassed by the inquisitive glances that the older teenagers sent them, and joined the line for ramen.

Seungwan gazed around the place with poorly-concealed curiosity, studying the older kids, the way they wore their uniforms, taking in every detail of how high-schoolers acted. Most tables were taken up by groups of friends, the majority girls, probably from the nearby school, but also a few boys that must have travelled here from their own school with romance on their mind.

Even more interesting to Seungwan was the minority of tables occupied by couples, a boy and a girl sharing a bowl of ramen or just chatting over ice cream or a soda. She wondered if she’d have this in high school as well, her mind stubbornly conjuring an image of Joohyun sitting with her, smiling in between sips of her drink, twirling her hair like that girl in the corner kept doing.

Her hand, which had been resting on Seulgi’s sleeve to keep her close, suddenly tugged insistently as she realized that she recognized one of the girls eating ramen with a boy. She discreetly pointed Seulgi in the right direction, who gazed first with confusion and then with widened eyes.

“That’s Joohyun-unnie!”, she exclaimed happily, so loud that half the people in the store turned to her. One of them was Joohyun herself, who started in her seat before locking eyes with them and immediately breaking into a wide smile. She beckoned them over, so Seulgi shoved Seungwan in her direction with the excuse that she had to stay behind and order for them.

In a few hesitant steps, she stood in front of the couple, the boy smiling affably and doing his best to conceal his frustration, while Joohyun seemed genuinely happy to see her. After further insistence by the older girl, she ended up taking a seat next to them, twiddling her thumbs as an awkward silence reigned for a few seconds.

“Ah!”, Joohyun interjected when she realized she was responsible for introducing the two strangers. “This is Kim Junmyeon-ssi”, she said, nodding towards the boy in front of her. Seungwan quickly got up to give him a small bow, but he waved her formalities away with a congenial smile. “And this is Son Seungwan-ah”, Joohyun added, and he smiled as he gave her a nod of acknowledgment.

The previous silence returned as Seungwan and Junmyeon gazed at each other awkwardly and Joohyun twisted in her chair to study Seulgi’s process. “Oh, she’s almost done”, she declared cheerfully. “You two can eat with us, then”, she concluded, and Seungwan didn’t miss the way Junmyeon’s pleasant smile faded slightly as a cloud of disappointment passed over his face.

It wasn’t the most comfortable situation, even after Seulgi had returned. She and Joohyun seemed entertained enough, happily chatting away, but Seungwan felt bad about joining their conversation and leaving Junmyeon silently slurping away at his ramen, so she held back and hesitantly asked respectful questions of the older boy, who seemed relieved at her attention.

Eventually, once she’d learned much more about his interests and hobbies than she’d ever been curious to know, they finished their meals. The two girls continued to chat, but she began to tug lightly on Seulgi’s sleeve, trying to get her to leave with her. As usual, Seulgi was oblivious to the situation she was interrupting, so when they finally got to her feet, she eagerly accepted Joohyun’s offer to buy her an ice cream.

“Isn’t it a little cold for ice cream?”, Seungwan asked with exasperation, glancing at Junmyeon with an expression that she hoped was apologetic enough, but Seulgi only shrugged the question away. For her, it was always the right weather for ice cream.

They left and Seungwan sat by Junmyeon’s side. She twiddled her thumbs some more as he pleasantly refrained from just shoving his phone in his face. “So, you two are friends with Joohyun-ssi?”, he asked after a moment.

“Yes, she’s staying at Seulgi-yah’s house while she goes to high school here in Seoul”, Seungwan explained helpfully. They lapsed back into silence, the situation almost painful to endure. Seungwan felt tempted to run after Seulgi and tug her away, but she didn’t want to be rude.

The older boy looked uncomfortable, his mouth hanging half-open despite no sound coming out of it, like he was struggling to pose a question. He tapped on the table and tried yet again before giving up and only throwing a forlorn glance at Joohyun, standing in the corner by the freezer.

Seungwan wondered for a moment if Joohyun seemed as unattainable to him as she was to her. If even handsome older boys grew tongue-tied and sweaty-palmed in her presence. If this boy felt even a fraction of what she felt for Joohyun, then she couldn’t find it in her heart not to try and help him. So she leaned a little closer, letting her eyes remain fixed on Joohyun’s back.

“She likes… flowers”, she said hesitantly, quickly filtering through all the information she’d amassed about the older girl and settling on flowers as the easiest thing to share. It would be harder to explain how she’d seen Joohyun stare out the window with that small smile enough times to know that she must love the way the sky blazed with colour as the sun set. Flowers were simpler to suggest.

Junmyeon nodded with reddening cheeks, eyes a little wide as he turned to her. “Thank you”, he said honestly, the shy smile on his face expressing how eagerly he’d received the information. He squeezed his hands together nervously, then got up as Joohyun returned with Seulgi in tow.

“I should get back to school now”, Joohyun immediately said with a polite smile. “Thank you for the ramen, Junmyeon-ssi, I had a nice time”, she added, not seeming to notice the way her words deepened the red colouring his cheeks. He bowed in goodbye, staying behind as the three girls left the store, Seulgi greedily licking her ice cream.

Joohyun waved them off, returning to school with her purple backpack in tow. As Seungwan turned away, guiding Seulgi along on their way home, she couldn’t help but wonder how much longer Joohyun would remain without a boyfriend. Junmyeon was nice and good-looking, if a little shy. If he made his intentions a little clearer, she saw no reason why the two wouldn’t get together.

After all, Joohyun couldn’t possibly go her entire high school years without dating. She was beautiful and she could have anyone she wanted. Seungwan tapped on Seulgi’s arm, where both her hands were wrapped to keep her close. Pretty soon Joohyun would be having ramen with her boyfriend, not just her suitor. Seungwan only hoped whoever that was would be good enough for her. Someone who would make her happy.

(…)

The second very important event that happened that Autumn was that Seungwan had her braces removed, after six gruelling months with those torture devices. The first thing she did was chew an entire pack of gum, which did just leave her with a very sore jaw, but she didn’t regret it for a second.

For the next few days, she made sure to smile widely whenever Joohyun was around, until the older girl finally noticed her shiny braceless teeth and congratulated her warmly on her newly-earned freedom, complete with a friendly pat on the back. It almost made the six months of braces worth it.

And finally, there was the third very important event. That one happened in November, when the cold months weren’t too far off and she and Seulgi had already given up on any path home except the one that minimized the time they spent in the cold and wind.

On that particular, very important day, Seungwan walked home alone, having left Seulgi behind to study at the library for a few hours. They had a big test coming up and Seulgi was having some trouble with the subject, so she’d decided to devote some extra hours to it in a place where she wouldn’t be as tempted to drop her books and sit down in front of the TV.

Seungwan would have been happy to stay with her, but the truth was that a cute boy from the class next to theirs was also studying there, and he and Seulgi had exchanged happy waves as soon as they’d locked eyes. Seungwan noticed the way Seulgi’s hand closed tighter around her own, her nervous laughter as the boy got up to greet them with a shy smile.

So she told Seulgi she’d go straight home, if that was okay with her, and left after a polite nod to the boy. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed a familiar box of snacks popping out of his backpack, and an exciting thought ran through her mind. It was Pepero Day. Was the boy Seulgi liked going to give her a Pepero stick? She smiled to herself as she left the school, sure that she’d be asking Seulgi for every detail of her afternoon once her friend got home.

She hurried home, hugging herself to ward off the cold as best as she could without Seulgi’s presence to help keep her warm. She was eager to get to her cosy bedroom, maybe curl up under a blanket with some hot chocolate, but still she found herself stopping in the middle of the street, staring at a convenience store.

It wasn’t the one near Joohyun’s school, since the closest route home didn’t come anywhere near it. It was just a random store, filled with people she didn’t know, which she confirmed with a closer look. So why had she stopped?

She finally realized the subconscious train of thought her mind must have followed as she saw a couple leave the store with matching chocolate-covered sticks in their mouths. The idea stunned her with its boldness, but she quickly found herself rationalizing it. Pepero sticks weren’t just offered to your boyfriend or your crush. Friends also exchanged the snacks, so it wasn’t like offering one of the sticks was a declaration of love. It was just a friendly action.

She walked into the store and made her purchase before she could talk herself out of it. Then she began walking home again, this time even faster, and no longer heading to a cosy bedroom. The new plan, which she had just formulated and which she nervously thought over as she walked with quick steps and clenched the box of snacks in her hand, was to visit Seulgi’s home and hope Joohyun would be around.

She probably wouldn’t be. She rarely was, and even if she happened to be home, she’d probably be up in her bedroom, which Seungwan would never dream of entering, especially not for something silly like this.

But if Joohyun was around, and if she was in the living room or the kitchen, and if she wasn’t too busy or on the phone or distracted with something else… Then Seungwan would muster up all the courage she’d ever had and she’d offer her one of the chocolate sticks she’d just bought. As a present from a younger girl to a senior she admired.

The secret knowledge of what it really meant to her, which she would keep to herself at any cost, was enough to make her dizzy with excitement. She nearly skipped the last few blocks to Seulgi’s house, hands growing sweaty despite the cold weather.

She rang the doorbell. She’d wait for a few seconds, maybe try ringing one more time, and if nobody answered then it meant that Joohyun was still at school and she’d go back home and eat her snacks alone.

The door opened and Joohyun appeared with a smile, stepping back at once to let Seungwan through. Her cheeks looked rosy and her nose was a little red, like she’d been in the cold not too long ago. Seungwan walked inside, blessing her luck as she leaned down to take off her shoes. The box of snacks had been shoved in her backpack, where it waited for her to gather her courage.

Joohyun’s face fell as she looked around Seungwan, finally turning to her with concern. “Is everything alright with Seulgi-yah?”, she immediately asked, eyes a little wide with worry. They seemed a bit red as Joohyun came closer to Seungwan. She probably wasn’t sleeping enough.

“Yes, Joohyun-unnie, she stayed at the library to study”, she quickly explained, glad to see how Joohyun relaxed with a short exhale and the previous smile returned to her face. As she began to look a little curious at the separation of the inseparable duo, Seungwan decided that she might as well tell the truth. “Can you keep a secret?”, she asked, somehow feeling as nervous as if the secret was hers.

Joohyun nodded with childish excitement, her smile growing wider. “You can’t talk to Seulgi-yah about it”, Seungwan insisted, and Joohyun nodded solemnly. “The boy she likes is there, so I left them alone”, she confessed in a whisper, like Seulgi could possibly hear her all the way from school. Her words brought a strange change to Joohyun’s face, her smile remaining in place but shifting into one she’d never seen before.

Then the older girl was turning around and heading to the living room. “Good decision. Now all four of us are happy with our company”, she threw playfully over her shoulder, stopping at the doorway and waiting for Seungwan to finish stepping out of her shoes. Her smile was now teasing and Seungwan nearly tripped over her own feet at the sight, as well as Joohyun’s words.

The TV was on when they returned to it, the volume low as it played a foreign movie that Seungwan didn’t recognize. The image was grainy and the colours strange, making her wonder how old it must be.

“I was watching some old romance movie. We can watch something else if you’d like”, Joohyun offered as she returned to her seat on the sofa. Seungwan sat nervously by her side, box of Pepero back in her hands as she awaited the right opportunity. Joohyun usually took the armchair and the unexpected proximity made her palms grow sweaty again.

“No, this is okay”, she said around the knot growing in her throat. “Don’t, um, don’t you have homework?”, she asked stupidly, like she wanted Joohyun to get up and go do homework or something.

“I figured one day off couldn’t hurt”, the older girl replied with a conspiratorial smile, turning to sit sideways on the sofa, her back against the armrest so that she was facing Seungwan. “What’s that in your hand?”

Seungwan had almost forgotten the box that she’d crushed quite heartlessly by now. As she raised it to show Joohyun, it looked like it had spent a week at the bottom at her backpack. That was probably good, though. It would be harder to explain why she’d come to visit Joohyun with a brand-new box of Pepero on this particular day.

Joohyun chuckled at the sight, but it didn’t look like she was going to make any comments, so Seungwan took a deep breath, as casually as she possibly could, and began to open the box. “Do you want one?”, she asked in a strangled voice, hoping her nerves wouldn’t be too obvious.

“I won’t say no”, Joohyun replied with a small shrug, shifting her position so she could lean closer to Seungwan and accept the snack. Butterflies sprang to life inside Seungwan’s stomach at the easy victory, the joy so overwhelming that her hands nearly shook as she held out the box. “But wouldn’t you rather be sharing these with the boy you like?”, Joohyun pointed out with a wink before taking a bite out of the chocolate-covered stick, already settled back in the sofa.

Seungwan knew she was blushing furiously, but she could do nothing to prevent it, so she only averted her eyes and nibbled on her own Pepero stick. “I don’t really have a… a boy I like”, she admitted truthfully, carefully concealing the part where she did have a girl she liked and she was exactly who she was sharing the snacks with.

She ate the rest of her snack in silence, then turned to Joohyun to find her still halfway through her own. “Maybe that’s for the best, you know?”, the older girl offered as she saw that Seungwan was studying her. “You have your whole life ahead of you. There’s nothing wrong with waiting until high school or… or even college”, she added in a low voice that trailed off to nothing as she took another bite.

Something in her words sounded off, or maybe it was just the way her face didn’t look so much like she’d been out in the cold anymore. Now the red nose and the bloodshot eyes began to make it seem like Joohyun had been upset, and the thought was like a blade being shoved through Seungwan’s heart. She’d always known that Joohyun could get sad. After all, nobody was happy all the time. But it still felt heart-wrenching to witness it. She grew pointlessly angry at the world for ever putting Joohyun in a situation that made her feel like this.

“Joohyun-unnie?”, she called out shyly, trying to recover the older girl’s attention, which seemed to have been stolen by the old movie still playing on the TV. The people on the screen, who had been talking so rapidly that Seungwan couldn’t understand a single word, now stood silently in front of each other. The woman leaned forward, eyes closed, but the man only watched instead of kissing her.

“Did you have someone that you wanted to give you Pepero?”, she asked in a low voice, unsure of how to proceed. Was that why Joohyun had been watching a romantic movie, on the verge of tears? She couldn’t imagine how Joohyun could possibly like someone that didn’t like her back. “Was it Junmyeon-ssi?”, she added after a moment, which finally got a response from Joohyun, although it was only a snort.

“Don’t worry, Seungwan-ah, I don’t like Junmyeon-ssi. Not like that, anyway”, she explained with a smile that began to look a little forced. “I just wanted to share Pepero with a friend, and now I am”, she continued, her smile growing warm as she aimed it at Seungwan.

“I’m your friend?”, she exclaimed with happy disbelief, unable to prevent the excited outburst. Joohyun laughed at that, as well as the way that Seungwan immediately shoved another chocolate stick in her mouth to keep herself quiet.

“Well, I think so”, Joohyun replied calmly. “We’re both friends with Seulgi-yah and we spend time together, all three of us, so wouldn’t that make the two of us friends as well? And now we’re sharing Pepero, so we really must be friends”, she finished smugly, reaching forwards to take another stick from the box without Seungwan’s permission, like she’d ever say no.

She sat in stunned silence, grateful that Joohyun’s attention had returned to the movie as she felt incapable of saying a single word. Joohyun was her friend. They were friends. The older girl enjoyed spending time with her, even when Seulgi wasn’t with them.

When Joohyun had come to live with Seulgi, less than a year ago, Seungwan had never once imagined that things could go like this. That she could ever be more than the awkward, tongue-tied girl that sat next to Seulgi on the sofa and snuck glances at the beautiful angel in front of her. But now they were friends. She was friends with the most wonderful person she’d ever met.

She took a bite of her snack and gazed distractedly at the TV, where the nonsensical and apparently endless movie still played. To her left sat Joohyun, her friend. She was so lucky.

(…)

On Seungwan’s birthday, as usual, she had a sleepover at Seulgi’s place. They stayed up until midnight, which was never a problem for the two of them, and Seulgi sang her the softest happy birthday she possibly could, trying hard not to wake anyone up.

They usually snuck some candies or chocolates to eat in celebration, and Seulgi proudly shared the sweets she’d managed to hide away in her bedroom. Just like every year, Seungwan focused hard on making a wish before going to sleep. She knew just what to ask: she wanted to be in Joohyun’s life forever. She repeated the words in her head until she finally drifted off.

In the morning, they were tired but excited, rushing to get ready for their day of celebration amid squeals and yelps at nothing in particular. After showering, they sat at the kitchen table, Seungwan diligently eating the seaweed soup her mother had packed her. Her spoon was halfway to her mouth when Joohyun joined them, walking slowly and still a little bleary-eyed. She’d decided to stay in Seoul during the break between school years, not bothering with travelling home for just a couple of weeks. She stumbled to the table, settling down by their side, and reached for an empty bowl and a pair of chopsticks.

“Happy birthday, Seungwan-ah”, she said with a smile, nodding at the container of seaweed soup. Seungwan grinned so widely that her cheeks hurt, despite the fact that there were probably bits of seaweed stuck in her teeth. Thankfully, Joohyun’s attention had already returned to her own food, a curtain of still-wet hair falling to shield her face from Seungwan’s.

She and Seulgi spent the day running around, visiting the arcade, the mall and even the park, when it grew a little warmer in the early afternoon. Her sister was home from school, so they had a family dinner in celebration. Not once in the entire evening did she get called a little mouse and she even got new clothes and a beautiful notebook as a birthday present.

Still, lying in bed and going over the day’s events with satisfaction, she knew what her favourite part had been, by far. As silly as it might seem to anyone else, it was the simple wish for a happy birthday that she’d received from Joohyun. Not only the words themselves, but everything about that moment.

She’d never spent the night at Seulgi’s during the week, not since Joohyun had come to live with the Kangs, and it had been the first time she’d seen Joohyun like that, early in the morning and not fully awake yet. Her eyes had been softened by sleep, like they couldn’t quite focus yet, and her slumped back as she leaned heavily on the kitchen table contrasted with her usual pristine posture, making her look more human despite remaining miles apart from everyone else.

Her voice, when she’d said those simple words, had been raspy and rough from sleep, like she was rolling little pebbles around in her throat. It had made Seungwan’s stomach twist as giddy little waves of hot and cold ran from her chest all the way down to her toes. It was a sound she’d never heard before and she registered it greedily, just like every other little detail about Joohyun.

She sighed into the empty room, indescribable happiness spreading through every inch of her and making her feel like she wanted to jump out of bed and sprint around her room, squealing it all out. It was the best birthday she’d ever had and she couldn’t wait to see what the future had in store for her.

“Happy birthday, Seungwan-ah”, she whispered softly, the words falling out of her lips with reverence. The words that Joohyun had said to her with her beautiful voice, shaped by her beautiful lips. The words that she’d hold in her heart forever.


	2. I wait for you still

After Seungwan turned 16, the world grew a little gloomier. The reason, as usual, was a beautiful angel called Bae Joohyun. For a year, they’d both attended the same high school and Seungwan got to see her more often than she’d ever dreamed. In between classes, at lunch, sometimes even crossing paths on their way out of the school for a snack at the local convenience store before returning for more studying.

Even more miraculous than that was the fact that, all through high school, Joohyun never once had a boyfriend, or at least one serious enough to be called as such. She’d sometimes have ramen with a boy who’d asked and she’d accept the presents that she was given on romantic occasions or just because, but she had never really dated anyone.

And that meant that Joohyun had the free time to pay Seungwan and Seulgi the kind of attention that seniors rarely bothered to bestow on their juniors. She would smile at them whenever they exchanged glances and, every once in a while, when they ran into each other at the convenience store, she’d share a bowl of ramen with them and ask them how things were going.

It was all so wonderful that it blinded Seungwan to the darkness looming in the horizon. It was only once exams were over and she could take a relieved breath that she remembered. Joohyun’s time in high school had finished.

Before she knew what was happening, Joohyun had graduated and packed her things to go visit her parents in the few weeks of vacation she’d have before returning for university. There, she’d be living at one of the university dorms. Joohyun’s stay with the Kangs was over and Seungwan wasn’t sure of when, or even if, she’d see her again.

“It’s not that bad”, Seulgi repeated to a downcast Seungwan who, as usual, lounged so unnaturally on the sofa that it actually began to hurt her back a little. She only groaned, offended at the ridiculous suggestion that she could possibly be okay without Joohyun. “I mean it, she’ll definitely come over for dinner every once in a while, and I can let you know so you can join us”

Seungwan huffed and twisted her body slightly. “Yeah, like once a month. And if I miss it because of school or a family dinner or something, that’ll be another full month without seeing her”, she complained in a voice that definitely wasn’t whining because she’d grown up and didn’t whine anymore.

She turned to face Seulgi, shifting up a little so she could rest her arm on the back of the sofa. “That’s no way to live, Seulgi-yah”, she proclaimed dramatically, earning a patient sigh from her friend.

“Okay, I might have an idea”, Seulgi admitted hesitantly. She chewed on her bottom lip thoughtfully, but Seungwan had already risen to clutch her arm. “I don’t know if you should, though. We should be focusing on school and it’s one thing to hang out with Joohyun-unnie when she’s here, but it’s another to be going out of our way to –“

“What’s the idea?”, Seungwan cut off, patience exhausted at Seulgi’s unending expression of concern. Her friend took a deep breath, accepting that she couldn’t go back now.

“Your sister is still in college, right?” Seungwan’s brow furrowed at the question. What did that have to do with anything? She nodded anyway, to confirm that Seunghee was still attending, although she was already on her last year. “And she’s in the same college as Joohyun-unnie”, Seulgi continued, but she didn’t get to finish her thought because Seungwan had already jumped up from her seat and now stood aiming a decided finger at her friend.

“I’ll go visit my sister and try to bump into Joohyun-unnie!”, she declared passionately, completely ignoring the way Seulgi’s mouth opened as if to contest the idea. “It’ll be tough at first, but if I can figure out her dorm room or the building where she has her classes, then I can hang around there and it’ll be more likely for us to meet”

Seulgi looked at her dubiously. “I actually meant asking Seunghee-unnie to talk to Joohyun-unnie and ask her if she’d be free to hang out with us or something”, she elucidated in what she probably knew was a wasted effort. “You never actually told her you wanted to spend time with her after she went to college”

“Obviously not”, Seungwan huffed out in incredulity. “If I told her that, she’d…” She paused, finding it hard to explain why exactly she couldn’t tell Joohyun she didn’t want to stop seeing her.

“She’d know you want to spend time with her?”, Seulgi finished for her. Seungwan decided to ignore the clear sarcasm in her voice.

“Whatever, we’re doing it my way”, she said with finality. Seulgi didn’t question it. After all, it was Seungwan’s decision to make. Even if she herself knew it wasn’t the most rational.

(…)

When she knocked on her sister’s door, she was met with an unlikely sight. Seunghee, always so composed whenever she came over for dinner, was now barefaced, her hair sticking out in all directions like she’d been running her hands through it for hours, and she wore old baggy sweatpants and a college sweater.

“What?”, she called out a little harshly before she recognized Seungwan. “Oh, sorry, I thought you were one of my project partners coming to bother me about… Whatever, you wouldn’t know what I’m talking about anyway, lots of business jargon”

She walked back inside her room, waving for Seungwan to follow her. The dorm room was a lot neater than her sister’s unkempt figure had suggested, the only mess being found in her desk, which was covered with an unbelievable amount of loose sheets of paper, with a laptop peeking out from under the avalanche of white.

“So, what’s my little mouse doing here in college?”, Seunghee asked with a hint of humour, smirking at Seungwan’s instinctive groan. “Or did I hibernate for two years and miss your graduation?”

“Nope, still in high school”, she said, mostly because she was still trying to figure out how to sound casual about visiting her sister for the first time since they’d helped her move into her dorm as a freshman. In her defence, she still saw Seunghee often in their dinners, so it wasn’t like they were estranged sisters or anything.

“Anyway, no need to make up an excuse, I know why you’re here”, Seunghee remarked with her back to Seungwan, luckily missing the way her younger sister nearly choked on air as she instantly panicked. “You met some cute upperclassman last year and now he’s in college and you’re trying to bump into him casually. Or are you bold enough to ask your unnie for introductions?”

She finally turned back to Seungwan with dramatic flair, fixing her with a piercing stare. Seungwan fidgeted under her sister’s gaze, somehow managing to look embarrassed even as she rolled her eyes. “It’s not like that! I was just visiting you, but if you’re going to be all ungrateful –“

“Oh, speaking of cute upperclassmen!”, her sister exclaimed, cutting her off. Her words were ominous, but Seungwan let her finish her thought, happy to pursue any topic that got them far away from the current one. “I am definitely not introducing you to any freshmen and you can find your crush on your own if you’re that invested, but do you know who I did run into? Bae Joohyun-ssi!”

Seungwan froze halfway through her protest that she absolutely did not want introductions, jaw nearly dropping at her unbelievable luck. “You know, your favourite unnie. You used to talk about her all the time, it was all I heard after dinner. She went to the same high school as you, right?” Her sister rambled on, but Seungwan was only half-listening, her mind already running at full speed to figure out how to get the introductions that she did actually want very much indeed.

“Oh, yeah, I ran into her a couple of times last year. I didn’t know she’d come to study here”, she lied as smoothly as she could manage. It shouldn’t be too hard to fake, since Seunghee couldn’t have guessed how deeply she still held Joohyun in her heart. After that first year of hopeless infatuation, Seungwan had slowly grown more cautious of showing her interest in Joohyun to anyone, even her family. She kept her thoughts to herself, and sometimes shared them with Seulgi, but to everyone else her childish girl crush on Joohyun had slowly faded down to nothing except maybe admiration for her senior.

“And it was totally by accident, too. She came out of a lecture hall right as I was going in, we just said quick hellos, but it was definitely her. She’s so pretty, it’s hard to get her mixed up with anyone else”, Seunghee carried on obliviously. She suddenly paused, tapping her chin thoughtfully. “Do you want to go say hi to her? It’ll help me keep an eye on you a bit longer, make sure you don’t go off to meet that freshman of yours”, she added with a teasing grin that made Seungwan wish she had an eraser nearby to throw at it.

“Whatever, I guess we could drop by. But I can’t stay too long, I have homework”, she added cleverly, trying not to sound too eager. “How do you know where she is, anyway? I thought you only bumped into each other”

“Duh, I know where the freshman dorm rooms are”, Seunghee replied with an eyeroll of her own. “Seriously, little mouse, for someone with such good grades you’re kind of a dummy” She had already stepped closer to ruffle Seungwan’s hair or something equally embarrassing, but the latter quickly evaded the manoeuvre and jumped out of the dorm room, waiting for her sister to lock up behind herself and follow along.

They made their way across the large dormitory complex, going up several flights of stairs until they were in one of the top floors. All around them were doors, evidently leading to dorm rooms, most of them with pieces of paper identifying the residents. Some students stood by open doors chatting, others walked with purpose, probably headed to the cafeteria or out to attend late-afternoon lectures.

Seunghee dragged her through a few corridors, absently checking doors until she found the one with Joohyun’s name on it. She turned back to make sure Seungwan hadn’t wandered off, then knocked on the door.

They stood waiting for a few seconds, but the door remained closed, no sounds coming from inside the room. “Huh, I guess she’s not in”, Seunghee mused out loud.

“Oh, that’s fine”, Seungwan quickly cut in, suddenly relieved that her reencounter with Joohyun wouldn’t be mediated by her sister. She could show up some other time, casually stroll through the corridor or hang out by the dorm entrance, something that would look a little less like her family was trying to introduce her to the new neighbour’s kid who was about her age. “I guess I’ll just see her whenever”

Seunghee studied her suspiciously. “You’re going to come back, aren’t you?”, she asked with a raised eyebrow.

“To visit your ungrateful self!”, she defended herself with blatant lies.

“To find your freshman, more like”, Seunghee grumbled, already pulling her away from the door. “Come on, I’ll walk you out then” She didn’t let Seungwan out of her sight once, not until she had been ushered out of the campus entrance and straight to the nearest bus stop.

She was right, of course. Seungwan was going to come back, and she’d keep coming back until she finally saw Joohyun again.

(…)

It took her a couple of weeks to find another free afternoon, but as soon as she managed it, she was on the first bus to the university. She wandered around, slightly lost, until she finally caught sight of the familiar dormitory complex. Inside, she debated visiting her sister but quickly decided that she had to run into Joohyun first, or she’d be doing it with Seunghee in tow.

She walked aimlessly down a few corridors until she began to feel a little self-conscious around the older men and women who would have been able to tell she was too young to be here even if she hadn’t shown up in her high school uniform. With one last casual round of Joohyun’s floor, she finally gave up and went down the stairs all the way to the lounge. There, she got a coffee from the machine and sat on one of the empty armchairs, pulling a notebook from her backpack but paying more attention to the people entering the room than the homework in front of her.

She’d only been there for about half an hour when Joohyun walked into the lounge with a few friends. Seungwan’s heart stuttered at the sight and she immediately dropped her head back to her notebook, even though the whole point of coming here had been to have Joohyun notice her. Somehow, now that the older girl was here, after so long without seeing her, Seungwan felt dreadfully shy, only daring to follow the movement of her group from the corner of her eye.

Her pencil had been hovering over the same sentence since Joohyun had entered the room, all her focus gone as she tried to simultaneously take in as much of the older girl as she could while not calling any attention to herself. And still, despite being so concentrated on Joohyun, she was startled when she heard her voice.

“Seungwan-ah?”, Joohyun called out happily, her voice unusually loud as it cut through the din of the lounge. It rang out perfectly clear and just as melodious as Seungwan remembered, and of course the first thing she did was jump in her seat and almost send her notebook flying at the person next to her.

Joohyun walked closer, a small amused smile on her face. “I thought it was you”, she commented as her prediction was confirmed. Seungwan got up to greet her, not sure whether to nod or bow and settling for something somewhere in the middle. She avoided looking at Joohyun’s friends, who were sitting at a table having coffee and watching them in between their conversation. “You know, you stand out a little in your uniform”, Joohyun added playfully.

“And you’re… not wearing a uniform anymore”, Seungwan replied awkwardly, gesturing towards the older girl. The truth was that she’d been a bit taken aback at the sight of Joohyun in casual clothes, so used to seeing her in their high school’s uniform every day of the week.

To her relief, Joohyun grinned with appreciation. “I know, it’s wonderful”, she said with only a hint of exaggeration. “If it weren’t for weekends, I’d have forgotten all about the existence of jeans by now” Jeans were exactly what she was wearing, a very flattering pair that Seungwan stubbornly avoided looking at from the moment she began to have thoughts of how flattering they were.

“So, what are you doing here?”, Joohyun asked after a moment where they just silently stared at each other, Seungwan too preoccupied with keeping her eyes on Joohyun’s and not wandering anywhere else to come up with a topic for conversation.

“I was, uh, visiting my sister. I think she’s in class or something, so I’m just doing some schoolwork while I wait for her to text me back”, she repeated the practiced lie. At least she could still remember that much.

“Oh, right, Seunghee-ssi. I met her the other day. We have classes in the same lecture hall”, Joohyun said, confirming what Seunghee had already told Seungwan. She turned back to her friends, who were leaving after their coffee and waving their goodbyes, then returned her attention to Seungwan. “Hey, I have to get back to my room, but you can wait there for your sister if you’d like”, she offered casually, like it was the simplest thing.

Seungwan nodded, trying very hard not to seem too enthusiastic. After all, they were friends, right? Or had that friendship ended when all external factors forcing them together had fallen away? Now that they hadn’t said a word to each other in over two months, maybe they were back to acquaintances. The awful thought helped bring down her excessive enthusiasm, at least.

Joohyun’s room was shared, two beds resting against opposite walls, but her roommate wasn’t there when they arrived. Seungwan couldn’t help but take a curious glance around the space, eyes falling on every personal object. She’d never gone into Joohyun’s room in the Kang home and this was an unprecedented look into Joohyun’s life and interests.

The older girl gestured towards her own desk, inviting Seungwan to take it while she sat on her own bed with her laptop. For a few moments, they worked in near silence, the only sounds being Joohyun’s typing and Seungwan’s pencil scratching against the page. That didn’t last very long, though, as Joohyun began sighing with increasing frequency before she shut her laptop and let it rest by her side.

Seungwan continued working, pretending not to notice how the older girl fell backwards on the bed with one arm over her face, but her concentration completely crumbled away when Joohyun finally rose and came to stand by her side.

“What are you studying?”, she asked pleasantly, in a completely transparent attempt to distract herself from her own work. Still, Seungwan wasn’t exactly eager to call her out on it, happy with the attention the older girl had decided to bestow on her.

“Maths”, she said a little shyly. Joohyun leaned over her shoulder to examine her notebook, hair coming so close to Seungwan’s face that she could smell her shampoo. Her heart began to beat faster, its drumming filling her ears.

“Oh, I remember this. Polynomials, right?”, Joohyun guessed, accurately interpreting the symbols and equations that she’d been scribbling. Seungwan nodded, sure that her shaky voice would betray her nerves if she tried to speak. “Do you want any help with it? I wasn’t too bad at this stuff”

She nodded again, trying her best to hide her reddening face with her hair, and Joohyun finally backed away to go steal her roommate’s desk chair and sit by Seungwan’s side. For over an hour, she patiently explained each step of each solution, guiding Seungwan through the process and watching as she solved some problems on her own.

Eventually, Seungwan realized that if she stayed any longer, she wouldn’t have the time to visit her sister, so she hesitantly got up to say her goodbyes. To her surprise, Joohyun took the initiative to pull her into a hug.

She froze in the older girl’s arms, her instincts failing her as her own arms only hung uselessly by her sides. After a moment, Joohyun moved away, looking a bit embarrassed herself. “Sorry, was that too much? It’s just… it’s nice to see a familiar face here. Everything’s new and sometimes it’s a lot”, she explained in a strained voice. Her hands lingered on Seungwan’s arms a moment longer before she let them fall, their absence sharply felt.

Seungwan finally recovered herself enough to speak, and she hurriedly reassured Joohyun that it was fine. It seemed to relieve her a little, as the familiar small smile returned to her face. “Whenever you’re around, visiting your sister or for whatever reason, feel free to drop by, ok? I can help you with school stuff, if you want, or we can just hang out. Watch a movie or something”

She knew that Joohyun’s invitation was partly given out of politeness and partly out of the desire for familiarity, but at least some part of it must have been because she wanted to see Seungwan, right? That was more than enough for her, more than enough for the smile on her face to grow wider and brighter and almost painful.

She barely remembered a word she said to her sister that day. Riding the bus home, her head was filled with Joohyun. Joohyun, who wanted to hang out with her. Joohyun, who must like spending time with her, at least a little bit. Once again, she could barely believe her luck.

(…)

She couldn’t visit Joohyun every week, but she tried her hardest to come by as often as possible. Her sister would have been suspicious at the frequency with which she ended up at the university, so half the time she didn’t even let her know she was visiting, heading straight to Joohyun’s dorm room and leaving it only to go to the bus stop. Seulgi helped cover for her, telling their parents that Seungwan was at school, studying with her, when really Seungwan was far from it.

Really, Seungwan was skipping the late-afternoon sessions of self-study to go visit her crush, who would certainly help her with homework if she asked, except she rarely did. The thing was, when they weren’t studying, they were sitting side by side on Joohyun’s bed, watching movies or dumb Youtube clips on her laptop. Sometimes they went down to the lounge for a warm drink and snacks, or to the cafeteria if they were especially hungry. Regardless of particulars, what really mattered was that when they weren’t studying, they were enjoying their time together, and Seungwan couldn’t spare a second thought to her maths curriculum when she was making Joohyun laugh with another stupid joke.

Now she was definitely sure that they were friends. She saw how Joohyun smiled when she showed up in her high school uniform, how her eyes twinkled right before suggesting that they go for a stroll around the campus, now that the weather was warm and flowers were blooming everywhere.

She walked confidently up the stairs of the dormitory complex, headed straight for Joohyun’s room, where she knew the older girl would be, because she already knew her schedule by heart. Some of her shyness had melted away as Joohyun had slowly evolved from the unattainable crush of her younger years to someone real and tangible, someone just as beautiful and perfect as before, but now also someone who was her friend and didn’t just indulge her with a playful smile and a pat on the head.

It was strange when she knocked and nobody came to open the door. Even stranger when she was sure she’d heard noises from inside, not the kind of sounds that would have her turning away with flustered embarrassment, but just a weak shuffling, interrupted by sniffling and even, when she leaned a little closer to the door, shaky and watery inhales.

She knocked again, a little worried. “Joohyun-unnie, it’s me, Seungwan”, she called into the door, trying not to be too loud and call attention. Still receiving no answer, she had almost made up her mind to leave, chest contracting painfully at the thought of Joohyun crying alone, when the door finally opened.

Joohyun stood there, with puffy eyes and a red nose, trails of tears still visible on her cheek despite her hasty effort to wipe them off. Seungwan wanted nothing more than to lean closer and brush every tear away, infuse Joohyun with some of the gentleness she so sorely deserved, but she knew it wasn’t her place. “Do you want to talk?”, she asked instead, all that she could offer. Joohyun nodded weakly and let her inside.

They sat on the bed, cross-legged and facing each other. The distance between them was greater than when they sat side by side, but Seungwan didn’t dare to come closer and Joohyun seemed too distracted to care either way, tears still pouring out of her eyes as she tried in vain to stop them.

Seungwan waited for her to speak, but she never did, so they sat in heavy silence. “Joohyun-unnie?”, she finally asked, and suddenly she was hit with a memory of years ago, of sitting next to Joohyun on Seulgi’s sofa, on November 11th, and asking her if there was someone she liked, someone who’d hurt her.

“Did someone break your heart?”, she finally added in a whisper. The thought nearly closed off her throat in anger at this unknown person who’d dared to bring Joohyun suffering, in empathetic sadness and helplessness, finding herself unable to heal whatever had caused the bitter tears running down the older girl’s face.

But there was something else, something new, something she didn’t like one bit. There was jealousy, clawing inside her chest and burning everything like an inextinguishable fire. Gone were the days when she’d watched Joohyun from afar, even helped boys woo her. Now the thought of her being with anyone else nearly made her suffocate in panic. She clenched the bedsheets a little tighter, hoping the bitterness inside her wouldn’t show. Joohyun needed a friend, not whatever this jealousy was making of Seungwan.

To her guilty relief, Joohyun let out a watery laugh at her words, reaching out for her hand without seeming to notice it. “No, it’s not that”, she replied simply, wiping her face again with her free hand. She sniffled, looking down at the bed instead of facing Seungwan. “I don’t know, I’m just… College is a lot more complicated than I thought and everything is so confusing”, she mumbled in a rough voice, sniffling again.

Seungwan eagerly squeezed the hand in hers, hoping to transmit some comfort that way. Joohyun smiled a little at the contact, tightening her own hold a little. “Is there anything I can do to help?”, she asked, her own voice a little unsteady. She swallowed, hoping to clear her throat and fight back the tears that seemed to be growing at the corners of her eyes.

Joohyun tapped on her hand, once, twice, three times. Seungwan followed the motion soundlessly, patiently waiting for her response. “Can you…”, Joohyun began uncertainly. Her voice failed her and she lapsed back into silence before trying again. “Can you keep a secret?”, she whispered so low that Seungwan barely heard her.

She whispered back an equally low “Yes”, then watched as the older girl shifted in place, opened and closed her mouth, looked around the room again and again before finally letting her eyes fall on their linked hands. She saw the way Joohyun’s face fell slightly and knew at once that she wasn’t ready to share her secret after all, so she took Joohyun’s hand in her lap and began to play with her fingers, not sure how to tell her that it was fine not to say anything.

When Joohyun looked up again, she gave the older girl a reassuring smile. “Seungwan-ah”, Joohyun called out with her own attempt at a grin, her voice aiming for conspiratorial but still too shaky to quite manage it. “Have you ever had somebody you liked?”

The question startled Seungwan, and her first instinct was to deny it, but there was something about the way Joohyun hadn’t asked about boys, no room for her to argue that her “no” wouldn’t be a lie after all. Joohyun’s hand was still in her lap, Joohyun’s eyes still on hers, and she knew that this somehow had something to do with cheering her up, so she admitted the truth with a nod, like the idiot she knew she was.

“What is it like?”, Joohyun immediately asked, eyes sparkling with curiosity and excitement. She’d only ever told one person before and it felt strange to be back in this situation. When she’d been younger, the answer had been right on the tip of her tongue, butterflies in her stomach and the sun in Joohyun’s smile, but now that she was 16 that answer felt so childish.

“Well, you know”, she said reluctantly, poking at Joohyun’s knee with the tip of her foot, but the older girl only smiled with amusement, silently encouraging her. “It’s… I guess it’s like, just being around them makes me happy, even if we’re not doing anything big. I look forward to the smallest things, even walking by them and our eyes meeting makes me feel giddy and smiley. And no matter how sad I am, how sad my feelings could make me, I’m always happy at the same time”

She shut her mouth abruptly, each sentence making her more embarrassed until she couldn’t take it anymore. Joohyun watched her closely, seeming to take in every word greedily, until she caught herself and returned to a more neutral expression. If she really hadn’t had her heart broken, then why was this so important to her? There were surely better ways for her to experience romance than through Seungwan’s immature experience.

“And when you think about kissing them?” Seungwan nearly choked, jerkily pulling her hand away from Joohyun’s as she coughed indignantly. Joohyun couldn’t just ask something like that, not when she sat right there in front of her with bright eyes and, now that she’d mentioned kissing, lips that had grown infinitely more appealing. Seungwan definitely couldn’t be thinking these things.

Joohyun only laughed as she flipped over to hide her face against the older girl’s pillow. “Ah, so you have thought about it”, she called out triumphantly, laughing again as Seungwan yelped into the pillow. “I was worried you’d be too young and innocent about those things”, she added jokingly.

She turned around to study Joohyun darkly. “I don’t think about it. I don’t!”, she insisted as Joohyun arched an eyebrow. “I couldn’t possibly, I can’t even… I can’t even imagine it”, she admitted, voice a bit softer.

“Well, I mean… Don’t you want to?”, Joohyun asked, suddenly looking a bit lost. She tilted her head and furrowed her brow like she was trying to wrap her mind around some difficult concept. Seungwan didn’t really understand the question. Of course she wanted to kiss Joohyun, it was just so unlikely that she could barely conceive of it. Still, Joohyun’s gaze was confused and searching, so she sat up with a sigh.

“Okay, uh, did you ever see those videos in science class? Of what the planets would look like in the sky if they were as close to Earth as the moon?”, she began. Joohyun studied her dubiously, but nodded along after a moment. “First it showed Venus and Mars and they were a little bigger but still pretty much just dots in the sky. Then Neptune and Uranus, and it was impressive, much bigger than the moon. And then it was Jupiter and just… This huge swirling ball of gases came up and filled the whole sky. You could see the currents on the surface of the planet, the way it rotated around its axis, it was so big that you could just see everything”

She paused, swallowing to wet her dry throat. Joohyun looked curious, probably wondering where she was going with this, and she began to feel like she should have just been a bit more prosaic about it. But she really didn’t know how else to explain it, so it would have to do.

“So I started thinking, this was just what it looked like when it was as far away as the moon. What would it look like coming closer? What would it look like if it crashed into the Earth? So I tried to picture it, that enormous planet coming closer and closer and filling up all the sky and still moving forward. The little stripes of colour, the circles that I knew were storms, growing until they were miles long, until the sky was only big enough to show the slightest fraction of the planet” She tapped her fingers against Joohyun’s pillow, trying not to focus on the way Joohyun’s mouth hung slightly open, like she was completely carried away by her silly story.

“But I just couldn’t imagine it, you know? I knew the theory, but I couldn’t wrap my mind around something that big, so far beyond anything I’ve ever seen” She couldn’t help a small smile, then. She was embarrassed by her exaggerated description, but seeing the way Joohyun seemed to have completely forgotten her tears and waited for the big finish with excitement, it felt more than worth it.

“That’s how I feel when I think about kissing… the person I like. In theory, I know how happy I’d be. But I just can’t wrap my mind around it”, she concluded awkwardly. “I can’t even imagine it”

Joohyun’s smile grew wider, then she moved a little closer and reached for Seungwan’s hand again. “You’re a real romantic, aren’t you?”, she asked lightly, the slightest hint of wonder still sparkling in her eyes. Before Seungwan could protest, she had already continued speaking. “Thank you, really. Talking to you helped a lot. I already feel better”

Seungwan was floored by Joohyun’s words, all protests forgotten at once. How could she have possibly helped? All she’d done was talk about herself and make dumb metaphors. Joohyun squeezed her hand, amused by her surprise. “It’s so easy to talk to you. It’s like big things stop being so big and scary for a while”, she confessed warmly.

“I’m glad we still hang out”, Joohyun carried on, happy to take over the conversation while Seungwan froze in a vain attempt to process all the wonderful things the older girl kept saying about her. “I really like you, you’re like one of my little sisters”

The comparison brought her back to reality with a jerk so sudden it almost gave her whiplash. She forced a smile on her face and checked her watch, infinitely relieved to see how late it was. Joohyun seemed to interpret her failing cheer as a consequence of the late hour, and quickly ushered her out of the dorm with promises that she was feeling much better, so much like the responsible older sister that she seemed eager to embody.

On the ride home, listening to aggressively cheery pop music and gazing blindly out the window, she couldn’t help but feel like she might have lied to Joohyun. Maybe these feelings inside her didn’t always make her happy. Maybe, sometimes, they just made her sad.

(…)

Joohyun was done with her semester nearly a month before Seungwan, which for once was a blessing more than a curse, as it finally allowed Seungwan to focus on her studies and finish the semester with good enough grades that her parents weren’t too suspicious.

Seulgi was the only one who knew that she hadn’t been working as hard as she could, and that her lowered grades weren’t a result of struggling, but simply of slacking off. All her afternoons spent with Joohyun were hurting her academic performance, and even though Seulgi would never recriminate her, she was still understandably concerned.

Seungwan spent the entire summer studying, doing her best to get back on track with her classmates. She knew she was lucky that things were that easy for her, that she didn’t struggle with academic stuff like Seulgi, or she might not have gotten back on track at all.

They sat side by side in her friend’s room, each girl studying her own textbook and helping each other with any doubts that might arise. It was the end of the summer vacation and Seungwan had already caught up to Seulgi, so that they both studied the same topics and most of the study session consisted of her helping Seulgi with the material that she’d absorbed more easily on a first read.

“Wannie?”, Seulgi called out as they skimmed the pages of exercises in front of them. She’d called for Seungwan plenty of times during their studying, but there was something different in her voice. “Are you sure it’s not enough to see Joohyun when she comes over for dinner?”, she asked hesitantly, eyes still fixed on the page in front of her.

Seungwan froze halfway through her scribbling, pencil tightly gripped in her hand as she held her breath. She knew this conversation had been coming, but it didn’t make it any easier to have. “You know it isn’t”, she replied simply. Especially now that she knew how much Joohyun counted on her, she thought but didn’t add out loud.

Her friend swallowed nervously, eventually glancing away from her textbook to study Seungwan. “I just… You’re better than this, Wannie”, she said sadly. She didn’t sound judgmental or even pitying, it was more like she simply couldn’t stand to watch Seungwan go down this path. “You could be at the top of our class. You could get into a good college”

She shrugged, trying not to get too defensive. “I’m doing okay”, she pointed out, because she couldn’t just agree with Seulgi. If she agreed, she’d have to do something. She’d have to change things.

“And that’s enough?”, Seulgi asked almost impatiently, before she paused to take a deep breath and put down her pencil. She reached for Seungwan’s hand, but she avoided the touch, pretending to be reaching for something at the other end of the table.

“Wannie, I know you don’t want to hear this”, she began, and Seungwan sighed angrily, her grip on her pencil growing so tight that she had to drop it before she broke it in half.

“So don’t say it”, she muttered, but they both knew that what she was really doing was begging. Seulgi’s voice softened at the request, but she didn’t stop.

“There’ll be other people. Other chances to fall in love and date. You’ll have your whole life for that. But high school is just once. The college entrance exam is just once” Seulgi’s hand fell on Seungwan’s shoulder and her friend waited until she’d turned around to face her before continuing. “You can have college and then love, but you can’t have love and then college. Not like this”

The chair screeched against the floor as Seungwan abruptly got to her feet. “You know, I already have a mother to tell me that. I don’t need another one”, she spit out as she hastily gathered her books and shoved them into her bag. Seulgi didn’t say anything else as she left, only watched her retreating back with a pained expression.

They met the next day and both girls apologized. Seulgi promised not to mention the issue again, not unless Seungwan seemed in serious danger of falling behind. Seungwan agreed to these conditions and they promptly resumed their friendship.

By the time Joohyun returned from her summer in Daegu, the argument had almost been forgotten, and Seungwan took advantage of her very first free afternoon to go visit the older girl.

(…)

The rest of the year went by in a flash. Endless mornings and afternoons of classes, evenings and weekends of studying, all broken up by the briefest glimpses of joy every time she skipped a self-study session to go take the familiar bus to the university and spend the rest of her day with Joohyun. Sometimes she’d even lie to her parents, tell them that she’d had dinner with Seulgi at school when she’d actually eaten with Joohyun at the college cafeteria.

It felt like her whole life built up to those moments with Joohyun, everything else fading to a blur until the older girl’s beautiful face and bright smile emerged from the mists and brought colour back to the world, just like the first time she’d seen her.

Autumn came, and then Winter, and every time it caught Seungwan by surprise, the ruthless passage of time sweeping her along until she was dizzy with speed. And still, among falling leaves and naked trees, in the first snow of the season and numb with cold, she went to visit Joohyun, the evenings with the older girl lighting the way like signposts along the highway of her life.

She found herself in Joohyun’s room, like awakening from a dream. It was cold outside, the world frozen and white, and they sat side by side under a blanket, watching something on Joohyun’s laptop. The clock on Joohyun’s nightstand showed the time in blaring red, letting Seungwan know that it was past 10 pm. There was a warm pressure in her hand, which she eventually realized was Joohyun’s hand, their fingers intertwined between them.

Mind suddenly miles away and completely abstracted from the movie on the small screen, she began to sweep her gaze around the dorm room. Joohyun’s roommate wasn’t there, as usual. The girl always went home on the weekends and she never stepped foot in the room during the day, so Seungwan only caught quick glimpses of her when she was leaving and the girl was coming in for the night. Now that the school year had ended, she had gone home for good, her side of the room already cleared out of all belongings.

On Joohyun’s side, everything looked as it always did, the same books on the shelves, the same relatively neat piles of papers on the desks, the same bedsheets. She looked again, a little closer, paying a little more attention, until her eyes fell on a heart-shaped box tucked away between the bed and the nightstand.

“You got chocolates for Valentine’s Day?”, she asked with a snort, body mechanically guiding her voice to a friendly teasing tone, with just the right amount of disbelief, even though her mind was busy going over every possible scenario for the existence of that simple, innocent-looking box.

Joohyun looked around for a second, confusion clear on her face, before she found where Seungwan was looking and chuckled lightly. “Oh, I’d forgotten about that” She reached down to pluck it out of its hiding spot and offer Seungwan a piece of chocolate. The inside was untouched, like she really had forgotten all about it. “But yes, apparently men in college are very progressive and won’t be held back by convention”, she added with playful sarcasm.

“Will you be paying him back on White Day?”, Seungwan returned instantly, easily playing along. She let her hand hover over the box for a few seconds, but in the end, she felt all appetite leave her and she let it drop back by her side.

Joohyun picked a piece at random and popped it in her mouth. “Oh no, I’m far too traditional for that”, she quipped, and they both laughed.

The conversation continued, easy jokes being exchanged between them, but Seungwan barely registered them. Her thoughts drifted back to the previous week, when her closest classmates had been badgering her endlessly about Valentine’s Day.

There was a boy, one year older than her, and he and his group of friends often showed up at the convenience store near Seungwan’s high school. He was tall, with a sweet smile and ears that grew red whenever he was flustered.

The first few times they’d crossed paths, he’d snuck glances at her table the whole time he was there, his friends erupting into raucous laughter a few times, clearly at his expense if his bright red ears were anything to go by. Eventually, he’d built up the courage to come over to the group of schoolgirls, and Seungwan had nearly choked on her drink when she’d realized it was her he’d been staring at.

It had been so unexpected, and he’d been so shy and nervous, that she’d agreed to have some ramen with him before she’d even realized what she was saying. Talking to him had been surprisingly easy, her effortless smiles enough encouragement for him to keep making silly jokes.

Of course, all it took was one evening with Joohyun for the poor boy to be driven entirely out of her head, so that the companionship barely had time to grow into infatuation before it was nipped in the bud.

Ever since then, they’d continued to meet for ramen every once in a while, even though things had never progressed beyond that, but Seungwan’s classmates interpreted her reticence as shyness on both parts and insisted that she should make some big move. As Valentine’s Day approached, they all tried again and again to get her to buy him chocolates. In the end, she never did.

It was getting late, she thought as she glanced at the clock again. She should go home. She didn’t want to miss the bus.

“Hey, isn’t tomorrow your birthday?”, Joohyun asked, cutting through her confused thoughts. She realized with a start that she was right. How could she have forgotten when just a few hours before, she’d been thinking about it? “Don’t you usually sleep over with Seulgi-yah?”

“Yeah, but I guess I’m getting a little old for sleepovers”, she said with a lightness she didn’t feel. The truth was that this would be the first year she didn’t spend her birthday at Seulgi’s house. When Joohyun had invited her over, the whole tradition suddenly seemed so silly that she hadn’t given it a second thought.

Joohyun smiled like she knew some secret she didn’t. Like the weight of her years had clued her in to some vital information that one day Seungwan would know as well, when she was mature enough. “You can stay here, if you want”, she offered, derailing Seungwan’s bitter musings. “We can have a little celebration at midnight. The cafeteria is closed, but we can get something from the vending machines. Or we can just have these chocolates”, she offered with a laugh.

“Actually, um, I should get going. My parents will be expecting me before midnight, I don’t want them to get worried”, she excused herself weakly. She got up and reached for her bag, turning her face as far away from Joohyun as possible because she didn’t want her to see how her fake smile faltered and crumbled.

Right after talking to Joohyun about her feelings, on that day when she’d found her crying, she’d realized that there were situations when, rather than happy and sad balancing out inside her, all the happiness seeped out and only misery remained. They were silly moments, sudden realizations of something she’d always known, but somehow in those instants when it became crystal clear, the truth grew so much more powerful and undeniable, so irresistibly crushing.

In those moments, she’d realize that she truly couldn’t have Joohyun. That she’d never be hers. That she wasn’t hers now that she was alone and she would be hers even less when she finally found someone else. That her love was doomed to be unrequited and nothing could change that. Nothing could make Joohyun feel the same way she felt, no amount of dreaming or wishful thinking.

But those moments of clarity were easy enough to handle. She had all the practice of years of hopeless pining. She had those early years where she hadn’t even thought it possible to touch Joohyun, let alone be with her in any capacity.

This realization, the one that had just hit her as she sat and stared at that box of chocolates, this was the one that she couldn’t shake off. The one that clung to her bones and sat there with heart-rending pressure.

It wasn’t just that she’d never have Joohyun. The truth, jumping out in all it’s harrowing splendour, was that as long as she wanted Joohyun she’d never have anything else. She’d sit there in her dorm room and she’d beg for scraps while her life drifted by her.

She wouldn’t have a good college. She wouldn’t have sleepovers with Seulgi. She wouldn’t have a clean conscience. She wouldn’t have that shy boy with a sweet smile. One day, she’d wake up and she wouldn’t have anything.

She paused by Joohyun’s door, looking down as she spoke to her. “Hey, uh, so my sister’s graduation was a couple of days ago” She had no idea how Joohyun reacted to her words because she refused to look up into her face. “So I probably won’t be dropping by as often. And school’s getting pretty tough, so I should… yeah”, she finished weakly, then turned on her heel and walked away before Joohyun could say anything, before she could convince her to stay.

She rode the nearly empty bus, eyes staring at nothing as she tried her best to keep from crying until she got home, just in case her parents were still up. If they knew she’d been crying they’d want to know why, and they’d know she hadn’t been with Seulgi, and they’d start asking all kinds of questions she didn’t even know how to answer.

She broke down a few stops away from home. Stepping out of the bus into the cold night air, she let the tears run in tracks down her face as she walked away from her house and down the street to an old playground she hadn’t visited in years, to pass the time until she’d stopped crying, or until she was sure that her parents had gone to sleep. She sat down on one of the swings and slowly moved back and forth, gloved hands first wrapped around the cold chains and eventually retreating to the warm comfort of her pockets.

She didn’t even know how long she spent on the swing, just gently rocking herself back and forth as the tears gradually slowed down until she was able to wipe the freezing tracks and none came to replace them. She looked down at her phone, mind feeling nearly as numb as her limbs. She’d promised her sister she’d come help her pack up her things, but now she didn’t think she could ever step foot in that school again.

She typed out a quick message with unresponsive fingers « Unnie I can’t help you with packing after all, I have a thing with Seulgi-yah » She hit send only a second before she realized how suspicious it was to send such a message at – she checked the time – at 1 am on her birthday. It was her birthday.

The phone sprang to life in her hand, the buzzing startling her so that she almost dropped it in the snow. The screen flashed, displaying Seunghee’s name, and she answered reluctantly, cursing her luck that her sister had been awake.

“Happy birthday, little mouse”, Seunghee’s voice sounded from across the line, the fondness and concern clear even through the phone’s speaker.

“I wish you’d stop calling me that”, she replied between sniffles, trying to conceal her crying but probably failing. “I’m not so little anymore”, she added with a humourless laugh.

“You’ll always be little to me, baby sister”, Seunghee pointed out, and Seungwan could almost imagine the teasing smirk on her face.

“I wish people would stop treating me like a kid”, she mumbled into the receiver. She pulled her coat a little tighter around her body, nearly shivering in the cold night air.

“Yah, he’d better have treated you like a kid!”, her sister immediately exploded, voice tense with indignation.

“Wha – Who?”, she asked with genuine confusion.

“That freshman of yours! I wasn’t born yesterday, Wan-ah, I know perfectly well you must have found him, to keep coming back that often” Before Seungwan could protest, Seunghee continued her speech. “And now you’re crying on your birthday because something happened with him, am I right?”

She sniffled again, the tears threatening to return, but she didn’t say anything, which was confirmation enough for Seunghee. “And he’d better have rejected you, because if he tried to make a move on my little sister I will get a name out of you and I will commit a crime”

This finally brought genuine laughter to Seungwan’s lips. “Unnie, nobody made a move on me. And nobody rejected me, either”, she said truthfully, and Seunghee must have heard the honesty on her voice because she didn’t even scoff. “I just…”

She took a deep breath and tried to organize her thoughts. She felt confused, torn between the simple feelings of the past and the uncertain mess that was her future. “What do you do?”, she finally asked in a weak voice. “When you want something that you know you can’t have, what do you do to stop wanting it?”

Seunghee sighed over the line and there was a beat of silence before she spoke. “The trick is… you have to act like you don’t want it. Live your life and make the choices you’d make if you didn’t want that impossible thing. And then, over time, it gets easier to pretend, until one day you’re not pretending anymore”

Seungwan remembered the time before her sister had gone to university, before Seunghee was even attending high school. She’d been young, probably 10 years old, and she remembered how her parents had argued with her sister over her choice of electives, how their arguments had become fewer as the years went on, how Seunghee had chosen her university course together with them, with no protests.

“Unnie, what you’re studying… It’s not what you wanted, is it?”, she asked, thinking back to her sister’s room, which had been decorated with her own drawings, beautiful landscapes and fantastical creatures that she produced in every second of her free time. She’d slowly dropped the hobby, and these days she barely even doodled anymore.

“It was the right choice”, Seunghee replied simply, voice so even that Seungwan was sure she’d debated it with herself many times before. “I don’t regret it”, she added firmly.

“And the impossible thing you wanted?”, she asked with an aching heart. “Did you stop wanting it?”

“Yeah”, her sister replied cheerfully, and it was so obviously a lie that Seungwan couldn’t help but laugh again.

“Are you just saying that because your baby sister is crying on the phone, at 1 am, on her birthday?”, she enumerated carefully, wondering if she’d forgotten any aggravating conditions. Maybe the fact that she was sitting alone in her childhood playground.

“Maybe”, Seunghee drawled out playfully. “Did it help?”

“Kind of, yeah”, she admitted. “I guess it kind of helps that I’m not only one, you know?”

There was a slight rustling sound, which she assumed was her sister nodding against the phone like an idiot. “Hey, I guess you won’t be coming to the university any time soon, but I’ll be moving out after graduation anyway, and in the meantime, I don’t know, if you want to talk or anything, we can go get a coffee somewhere, ok?”

Seungwan frowned at her sister’s words. “Won’t you be busy with starting work and everything?”

“Well, yes, but I’ll always be busy. I won’t always have a little mouse that needs me”

She smiled against the phone. Having an older sister was usually a pain, but sometimes it just felt so nice to have someone who would love her unconditionally and who wouldn’t judge her like her parents might. She wanted to say something to express her gratitude, but all she got out was a sneeze.

“That doesn’t sound good. Did you catch a cold going home?”, her sister asked with concern.

“Actually, I’m not home yet”, she admitted sheepishly, grimacing at the scandalized yell her sister let out at the information. “I’m, uh, at the playground down the street”

“Get home right now, you insane person! It’s the middle of the night, you’ll freeze!”

She agreed to go home right after their call was done, wincing at her sister’s high-pitched voice, then said her goodbyes and slid the phone back into her pocket.

She looked around at the light layer of snow that covered the playground, curiously observing the way the street lights cast irregular patterns on the carpet of white, their light cut off by branches, as well as leaves from the few evergreen trees in the park.

With firm hands, she stood up from the swing and patted down her coat. She took a deep breath that left her in a little white cloud, slowly fading away to nothing.

“Happy birthday, Seungwan-ah”, she whispered to the night sky, where not a single star was visible. “Time to grow up”


	3. I remembered you older and taller

Seungwan turned 18 just a few weeks before moving away to college. High school had been hard, a whirlwind of classes and late evenings of studying and even a few sleepless nights trying to keep everything on track. Seulgi had been exaggerating when she’d said that Seungwan could be top of their class, of course, but she hadn’t ended up too far off from it.

She never did date that shy boy. Her epiphany had arrived a little too late for them. But somehow, a few months into her second year of high school, she realized that her sister had been right. Every breath was a little easier than the last. Day by day, the image of Joohyun that seemed to have been imprinted in the back of her eyelids faded, faded down to nothing. Faded until she felt like she could feel anything but that all-encompassing aching, that longing that had almost made her change her mind a few times.

And in her senior year, she did date. Not only did she date, she kissed. With breath shortened by excitement, and constantly interrupted by her classmates, she shared stories of dates and kisses. She felt like any other high school student. She felt confident.

So she didn’t think twice when she applied to her sister’s alma mater, her grades in the college entrance exam guaranteeing that she’d get in. The school had thousands of students and, after two long years, it was finally time to stop letting her choices be dictated by Joohyun.

The first few weeks were great. After high school, college was almost relaxing, and Seungwan enjoyed herself as she made new friends and joined study groups. She’d stay up late having ridiculous, pointless debates with groups of boys and girls, co-ed education a breath of fresh air after so many years in a girls-only school.

And then one day there was a knock on her dorm room door and she swung it open to find someone that she knew she’d run into sooner or later. She just hadn’t expected it to be like this. But there she was, looking strangely unchanged when Seungwan herself felt like she’d become an entirely different person in the past two years.

Except that now, as beautiful brown eyes bore into hers with the same familiar twinkle, all those changes seemed to melt away and leave her feeling like the same awkward 16-year-old girl. The one who’d cried in a freezing playground, but also the one who’d reddened under a curtain of hair as Joohyun leaned over her shoulder.

She swallowed down the urge to slam the door shut and made her best attempt at a natural-looking smile. “Joohyun-unnie!”, she exclaimed with far too much cheer. “What a surprise!”

“Son Seungwan-ah!”, Joohyun declared, tapping on the paper by the door that identified the room’s occupants. “I knew you had to be around here somewhere. Seulgi-yah told me you were studying here, congratulations!”

The smile threatened to turn into a grimace, but with a herculean effort, she managed to divert all the nervous energy running through her body into a slight widening of her eyes, which could surely be taken as pleased surprise. She made a mental note to murder Seulgi as soon as she had the time. “She did?”, she asked pleasantly.

“Well, not exactly. I asked her”, Joohyun admitted with a self-conscious chuckle. Perhaps Seulgi could live, then.

“You did?”, Seugwan inquired again, surprise really threatening to overpower her at this point. She was still trying to sound pleasant but even she could tell that she’d crossed over to incredulous.

Joohyun’s face fell slightly, the veneer of composure cracking as she shifted in place. “Is that weird? That I asked?” She seemed to catch herself then, a light, easy smile taking its place on her face. “You were, you know, my buddy” The words sounded so strange that Seungwan wondered for a second if Joohyun would lean forward and punch her shoulder or something. Her buddy?

“It’s not weird, I just… I thought you’d have forgotten all about me by now”, she remarked casually, even adding a little dry laugh to make sure Joohyun didn’t realize how much she wasn’t joking. She noticed her hand was still on the doorknob and slowly released it, letting both hands hide in the security of her jean pockets.

“Does that mean you’ve forgotten all about me?”, Joohyun wondered playfully, appearing to be back in her comfort zone, and Seungwan had to stifle an actual laugh at that. When had her life become so much of a sitcom, that her crush of 5 years would come by and ask if she’d forgotten about her?

“Of course not”, she replied quickly, once again hoping that the dire honesty of her confession wouldn’t come across. She was going to add something else, but then Joohyun smiled, a happy, genuine smile, and she felt something warm and incredibly dangerous building in her chest, so instead of talking she let her jaw snap shut almost painfully.

“We should catch up”, Joohyun said after an awkward pause where they both just stared at each other silently. “Maybe we could have lunch?”, she suggested with a nod towards the corridor.

“Oh, right now?”, Seungwan asked like an idiot, very frustrated at the way her head suddenly felt like it had been stuffed with cotton candy instead of a brain. Thankfully, years of diligently avoiding Joohyun, going so far as escaping Seulgi’s house as soon as she heard that the older girl would be coming over for dinner, had left her with some helpful instincts.

“Today is a really bad day, actually. I have a study group all afternoon”, she immediately began to lie, hardly giving Joohyun the time to nod in confirmation. “I actually already ate. You know, because of the study group. I was on my way out”, she added, throwing a hurried glance around her room to quickly find her backpack and fling it over her shoulder.

Joohyun insisted on walking her out of the building, so that she had to endure a few more minutes of small talk, heart pounding in a way that was infuriatingly familiar. As soon as she was outside, she waved goodbye and walked as fast as her short legs could carry her, only stopping when she was all the way across campus.

Only then did she stop to take deep, calming breaths, the cold air of early spring helping to clear the haze in her mind. She wasn’t who she’d been in high school and she certainly didn’t feel the way she had back then, but every moment that she spent with Joohyun threatened to plunge her back into an infatuation that she absolutely did not want to revive.

She’d have to avoid her, it was as simple as that. It was a childish thing to do, but sometimes childish means were necessary to achieve an ultimately mature goal. And this particular goal was worth all the childish avoidance she could manage.

(…)

Of course she didn’t completely avoid Joohyun. After some calming down and the emergency study group she’d convened in the paranoid fear that Joohyun might somehow discover her lie, she’d realized that she couldn’t simply walk off in the other direction whenever the older girl showed up. It was rude and really, it wasn’t Joohyun’s fault that Seungwan had spent her entire adolescence in love with her.

So she avoided Joohyun politely. She’d greet her when they ran across each other, but she'd quickly remember some prior engagement that kept her from staying and chatting. She’d make up plans whenever Joohyun invited her to do something, to the point that the older girl must think she was the most popular person in school by now. And yes, if she saw Joohyun before being spotted, she would absolutely walk off in the other direction.

It wasn’t as bad as she’d expected it to be. It was always a little difficult to walk away from that warm, inviting smile, and it did hurt her heart a little to have to keep rejecting Joohyun’s offers, but she always felt so proud of herself after each encounter that it actually became a little easier with time. Like avoiding Joohyun had just become another part of her college routine. Which was exactly why she should have known it couldn’t last. The universe was never that kind to Son Seungwan.

It was a quiet Thursday night, the rowdier freshmen all gone to engage in some underage drinking with their upperclassmen and leaving behind only those too shy, too busy or too tired to start their partying before the weekend. Seungwan was already in bed, partly because she wanted to get some rest while she could and partly because her roommate was a little scary and it was easier to go along with it when the girl wanted an early night.

In the end, however, the party seemed to come to Seungwan, because the lights had been off for less than an hour before there was a knock on their door. Even through the darkness, she could feel the glare from her roommate, who clearly assumed the knock was for her, so she hurried out of bed to confront the intruder.

As soon as the door was open, a familiar-smelling figure was wrapping her in a hug. Seungwan barely had the time to recover from her shock when she realized Joohyun was sobbing in her arms. She tried to pull back and get a good look at the girl’s face, but her embrace only tightened when she sensed Seungwan pushing her away.

“I’m sorry, I know you don’t want to see me”, Joohyun mumbled against her shoulder, sending a stab of guilt through Seungwan. She’d hoped Joohyun wouldn’t notice, but how could she not, after a while? “But I just…” She paused, took in a sharp breath that turned into a sob halfway through. “I just don’t understand. If it’s the right thing, then why does it feel so hard?”

Seungwan was beyond confused at this point, but Joohyun still refused to let go of her, and her roommate had already begun to clear her throat from somewhere behind them, so she gave up and let her hands rest on Joohyun’s back.

“Ok, let’s go get some coffee, how does that sound?”, she offered in a soothing voice. Joohyun nodded slowly then finally stepped away, although her hands immediately found Seungwan’s and clung to them like she was worried she’d run off otherwise.

They walked down the stairs and all the way to the lounge in a silence that only made it easier for Seungwan to get lost in thoughts of just why she was doing this. It was a mistake, she knew it was, but Joohyun had sounded so desperate and she didn’t even seem that drunk, so her emotional outburst couldn’t just be blamed on alcohol. She couldn’t simply kick the girl out and tell her to deal with it on her own, could she?

It was only when they reached the vending machines that Joohyun finally spoke up. “I don’t even like coffee”, she whispered self-consciously as Seungwan slipped some coins into the slot.

“You can have hot chocolate, I guess”, she replied a little awkwardly. Joohyun looked strangely small and vulnerable and she wasn’t sure what to make of it. She had to fight back the instinct to wrap the older girl in another hug and just rock her from side to side until she stopped crying, not only because it was something she shouldn’t indulge, but because it really looked like Joohyun needed to talk about whatever was wrong.

They sat down with their warm drinks, the lounge entirely vacant at such a late hour. It was a place for daytime socialization, not really used for studying or for evening drinking, so it quickly emptied out a few hours after dinner. Taking small sips of the coffee she really shouldn’t be drinking at such a late hour, Seungwan watched as Joohyun stirred her hot chocolate around a few times, then gave up and set the cup down on the nearest table.

“I’m sorry for bothering you”, she said in a hoarse voice, tangling and untangling her fingers in her lap. “Maybe I should just… This was stupid”, she concluded suddenly, turning around as if to get up but not quite managing to leave the sofa, not with the way Seungwan’s hand had wrapped around her wrist.

“What’s wrong?”, she asked simply, and immediately Joohyun’s eyes were filling with tears again. She seemed ready to pull Seungwan into another clinging hug, but she leaned back against the sofa with a few deep breaths, evidently calming herself down.

“Everything is so… confusing and complicated”, she began slowly, hands following the patterns of the fabric on her cushion. Her voice grew thick near the end of the short sentence, but she swallowed it down before carrying on. “It only ever made sense when I talked to you. And then you left and I just… I got all confused again”

Seungwan could barely hear the low whisper, but even though the words were registering, she had no idea what Joohyun was trying to say. What did she have to do with anything? “What do you mean? How did I help?”, she asked slowly, hoping her questions wouldn’t scare Joohyun off. She already seemed reluctant to speak, the slightest push could have her closing up.

For a moment, Seungwan thought that was exactly what would happen, as she saw Joohyun open and close her mouth in a silent struggle. She was reminded of a similar scene, two years earlier, when the older girl had eventually lost her inner battle and kept her secret. But this time, Joohyun’s face didn’t fall. Instead, her brow set in determination for the briefest moment before she looked small and vulnerable again. Her fingers continued to sketch the lines in the material of the sofa and Seungwan finally reached forward to grasp her hand.

“Do you remember when I asked you about your crush?”, the older girl asked in a voice so low that Seungwan suspected she didn’t want to be heard. She nodded, thumb brushing slightly against the back of Joohyun’s hand as she tried to ignore the way her heart jump-started at the question. Why was Joohyun bringing this up now? “You seemed so happy and… You really made it sound like it was the most wonderful thing imaginable”, Joohyun continued with a small smile.

“It made me realize that it wasn’t supposed to feel like…” She bit her lip, mulling over her words. Seungwan continued her rhythmic caress, which did seem to calm down Joohyun, at least a bit. “It made me realize that I’d never felt that way”, she tried again. “Or… I did. Once”

And then the most beautiful smile grew on Joohyun’s face, a shy little thing that still managed to light up her features like nothing else. The smile of someone who had something precious, something they’d kept just to themselves, something they took out at night, when nobody else was around, to gaze at it with adoring eyes, committing every inch of it to memory before hiding it again and going to sleep.

It was a smile that Seungwan knew well, because she’d felt it herself so many times before. And maybe that was why Joohyun’s next words didn’t shock her quite as much as they should have.

“She’s the reason I like purple so much”, the older girl confessed with a self-consciousness that couldn’t hide the pure awe the words brought her. She raised her face to gaze into Seungwan’s eyes, looking slightly pale but unflinching. “You helped me understand that I’m… I’m gay”

Her eyes widened at her own admission, but Seungwan could only look at her silently, reeling in the sudden discovery. Joohyun was gay. And that crush… Joohyun had bought her purple backpack a few months into high school, Seungwan would never forget a detail like that. Had she really been struggling with this for all those years?

“I’ve never said that out loud” Joohyun’s voice sounded a little hollow, a little like panic was beginning to come in at the edges. Her grip on Seungwan grew uncomfortably tight and it finally snapped her out of her own thoughts.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, alright?”, she said as comfortingly as she could, resuming the steady motion of her thumb as she gazed right back at Joohyun. “There’s nothing wrong with that. There’s nothing wrong with you”, she insisted. Nobody had ever told Joohyun that and she was sure the older girl needed to hear it, at least once.

Joohyun’s eyes widened at her words, her lower lip quivering like she was going to start crying again, but instead she only laughed, the sound a little dry and sardonic. “There you go again, making it sound so simple”, she commented with detached humour. Her gaze dropped to their hands, still linked together, and the small smile that she’d mustered up faded to nothing.

“What if I’m throwing my life away?”, she whispered, then bit her lip as she continued to look down.

“And if you ended up with someone you didn’t love, couldn’t ever love, what would that be?”, Seungwan riposted simply. Joohyun didn’t answer that, only gazed at their hands like she could barely see them, eyes unfocused as she struggled with something that Seungwan suspected she’d never fully accepted, something she’d tried to push to the back of her mind for as long as she could.

As she watched, the confusion in Joohyun’s eyes only grew, and she wasn’t sure how to help, what to say, so she did the first thing that came to her head. She pulled her in by their linked hands and wrapped her in a hug. “I’m here, unnie. I’m not going anywhere”, she reassured the trembling girl in her arms. “Everything’s going to be fine”

For once, her heart didn’t begin to pound as Joohyun’s arms hesitantly came up to hold her. All she could think of were Joohyun’s eyes, full of fear and uncertainty and unshed tears. She slowly ran her fingers through the older girl’s hair until the trembling abated and she began to slump against Seungwan’s firm embrace.

“Do you want to go to bed?”, she asked quietly, face near Joohyun’s ear, and she felt the answering nod, as well as the way slender arms tightened around her, keeping her in place. “Do you… do you want me to…”, she stuttered out, hesitation clear in her voice, and Joohyun immediately pulled back.

“I’m sorry, you don’t have to, of course. I mean, it’s a probably a little uncomfortable, with me being… you know…”, she mumbled nervously, looking a little ashamed of even implying she’d like Seungwan to sleep with her. Not like that, Seungwan reminded herself, growing embarrassed herself.

“No, that’s totally fine, I wouldn’t… think that you…”, she replied hesitantly, tripping over her words and suddenly avoiding eye contact. “I mean, I’m like your little sister, right?”, she pointed out awkwardly, adding a little chuckle at the end that only made her sound weirder.

That seemed to ease Joohyun’s fears a little, if only because it appeared to amuse her. “You probably didn’t like that, did you?”, she asked playfully, and Seungwan wondered for a second if she’d just stepped into a very bad situation. “I know I wouldn’t have liked it if someone older put our age difference between us like that”

Joohyun fiddled with the buttons on the cuff of her shirt, suddenly shy, and Seungwan discreetly let out a relieved breath. “I shouldn’t have said that, honestly. You weren’t like a little sister, you were my friend. I think”, she added nervously, glancing up at Seungwan for a moment as if to check. “The truth is, I felt like you were someone who admired me as a kid, and there I was breaking down in front of you. I didn’t want to be that person, I guess. I only said it because it made me feel like I hadn’t lost that, like I could still be that cool unnie you looked up to”

It was all a lot to take in. In a single conversation, Joohyun had rewritten their entire shared history. Seungwan felt like she’d need at least a day to sit down and sort through memories, to look at them from this whole new perspective. She only wished she could somehow go back and take away the bitterness.

She still remembered exactly how Joohyun’s words had made her feel, how they’d cut at her. But maybe it had been for the best. This way, she’d been able to walk away and live her life. If she’d had any hope, she might have never left, and then where would she be?

“Let’s go, then”, she said with a smile, getting up and offering Joohyun her hand. The older girl took it gratefully, if a bit surprised, and let herself be guided out of the lounge. It was only as they were walking up the stairs that she shuffled a little closer to Seungwan, linking their fingers together and mumbling such a soft “thank you” that Seungwan wondered if she’d even been meant to hear it.

That night, they slept tangled up in Joohyun’s tiny single bed. Cradling Joohyun’s head against her chest and gently brushing her hair away from her face as the older girl drifted off to sleep, Seungwan knew she’d already made her decision. Joohyun needed a friend, someone to help her go through this, and that came before any childish, half-forgotten crushes.

She felt Joohyun’s arms loosen around her as the older girl fell asleep. In the near-darkness of the room, she could see the outline of her face, the way her mouth hung slightly open, how the crease in her brow slowly evened out with every steady breath.

Lying there with Joohyun asleep in her arms, she couldn’t help but feel like the older girl wasn’t so much older anymore. She wasn’t an angel or a goddess or some ethereal being entirely out of reach. She was just a girl, as human and insecure as anyone else. She was just Joohyun.

(…)

At first, Joohyun seemed a bit reticent to open up to Seungwan, unsure of how much she could share without making her uncomfortable. However, that quickly changed when she found that Seungwan was bi. She hadn’t wanted to intrude on Joohyun’s moment, so she hadn’t told her right away, but as soon as she did, Joohyun’s demeanour changed radically. Suddenly, it was as if she would never run out of things to talk about. She wanted to ask everything, compare everything, with a childlike enthusiasm that never seemed to run out.

It was a side of Joohyun that Seungwan had never really faced before. Now that she looked at Joohyun as an equal, there was a lot there that she realized she’d never noticed before. Not just the uncertainty and fear, but also the innocence and youthful enthusiasm that fuelled the older girl’s frequent bouts of laughter, the silliness and even, in certain situation, the impetuousness that had her making decisions without a second thought.

This time, falling in love was gradual. She was aware of it, every day and at every instant. She felt the way each of Joohyun’s smiles dug deeper into her heart, the way the warmth of each hug lingered longer on her limbs. She felt it drape over her, settling closer and more comfortably, like slipping into a cold bed that slowly grew warm, blankets fitting snuggly around a body that relaxed into sleep.

It was a different kind of love, a resigned feeling that didn’t control her the way her emotions had done before. Sometimes it felt like she could step back and simply observe it, like a cold fact. She knew she was falling for Joohyun all over again, but it was simply something that occurred, no more noteworthy than the lengthening of the days as Summer approached.

And really, she barely had any time to focus on it, not with the semester coming to an end and her days being divided between studying, meeting her classmates and seeing Joohyun in every gap she could find.

When the summer vacation finally arrived, Joohyun surprised her by announcing that she wouldn’t be going home to Daegu. She’d told her parents that she needed to stay at school and study, but her real intention was to take advantage of all their free time, so that the two would finally be able to have conversations that weren’t constantly being interrupted by papers and tests and projects and the guilt of spending an entire afternoon without studying.

Seungwan had already decided to spend her vacation at home, keeping her parents company now that both their children had moved out, not to mention how Seulgi had made the same decision and this would mean they could see each other much more easily, neighbours once again. With Joohyun’s presence, sometimes coming over to the Son or Kang home but mostly staying at the university where Seungwan took the bus to visit her, it almost felt like time had turned back. Back before high school, before that painful resolution to grow up.

But Seungwan had grown up. She’d grown up so much, in fact, that now that they sat at a cosy coffee shop and stared at their drinks, she was the calmest of the three. Seulgi looked between her and Joohyun with a slight air of confusion, while Joohyun herself seemed close to passing out, stirring her tea with a shaky hand and sporting such a serious look that she almost looked angry.

Seungwan had told her all about how Seulgi had always been supportive of her orientation and Joohyun had decided that it was only right to come out to her as well. Seungwan did insist that it was something she didn’t owe to anyone, and that she shouldn’t push herself to do it if she didn’t feel ready, but once again Joohyun’s stubborn impetuousness kept her from backing down.

So there they sat, an awkward atmosphere slowly falling over the three friends as Joohyun’s stirring only intensified. Eventually, moved by pity or maybe just uncomfortable in the tense mood, Seungwan reached out her hand and grabbed Joohyun’s, guiding her to drop the spoon and let her hand fall by the cup. Her fingers immediately started drumming on the tabletop, but Seungwan could only do so much.

Seulgi turned to Seungwan for guidance and, after a moment of hesitation, she simply nodded towards her drink. They should just get comfortable and act normally, instead of sitting there and waiting for Joohyun to build up her courage. Seulgi seemed to agree, as she lifted her mocha to her lips and took a sip, eyes fluttering closed at the sweet taste.

While her friend was distracted by her drink, Seungwan gently squeezed Joohyun’s hand, hoping to infuse her with some of her own confidence that everything would go alright. The older girl turned to her as much as her rigid posture would allow, the tiniest hint of a grateful smile flashing for a second before her face was back to its frozen expression.

It was all getting a bit too uncomfortable and still Joohyun didn’t seem ready to say anything, so Seungwan finally decided to intervene. “So, Seulgi-yah, did you think about the motorcycle thing?”, she asked pleasantly, alluding to a conversation they’d had a few days earlier, when she’d had dinner at the Kang’s and then they’d gone for a late-night walk. “Do you really think you can convince your parents to let you get one?”

Seulgi smiled, clearly pleased to have a topic of conversation and no longer wait in unnerving silence, but just as she’d opened her mouth to respond, she was cut off by Joohyun. “That’s alright, Seungwan-ah, I can do this”, she stated decisively, sliding her hand out from under Seungwan’s to squeeze it in her own. She took a deep, steadying breath and gazed straight at Seulgi.

“Seulgi-yah, I wanted to talk to you today to let you know that…” She faltered, swallowed drily as Seulgi’s eyes grew a little wider in worried anticipation, then studied the room around them as if to check that nobody was too close. “That I’m gay”, she concluded in a lowered voice, leaning in slightly to shorten the distance between them.

The girl sitting in front of them blinked a few times, clearly taken by surprise, then realization flooded into her eyes and she broke into an encouraging, if a little confused, smile. “I’m really glad you wanted to tell me, unnie”, she said honestly, the smile growing a little at the utter relief on Joohyun’s face, so overpowering that she even slouched a little in her seat. “I don’t, um, I’m not really sure what to say, but I guess I’m happy for you? Is that a weird thing to say?”

She turned to Seungwan, who had somehow been promoted to the resident expert on how to react to a coming out. “I think the key is the acceptance, the wording doesn’t matter as much” She leaned towards Joohyun for confirmation. “Right, unnie?” The older girl immediately nodded, an embarrassed but bright smile on her face. She slowed down the movement, then looked up to lock eyes with Seulgi before nodding some more.

Joohyun’s tightly clenched hands finally separated, one returning to its previous place on the table as the other reached for her tea. Seungwan considered reaching to hold Joohyun’s hand again, but opted to simply let her own rest by its side, only a few inches separating their pinkies. She looked up just in time to see Seulgi studying all these motions, her eyes falling meaningfully on the scant space between their fingers, and she saw the dangerous gears turning in her best friend’s head.

Seulgi opened her mouth and Seungwan scooted forward ever so slightly. “So, are y-you…”, she stuttered as Seungwan’s foot landed solidly on her shin. Their gazes locked and a silent communication began between the two friends, all in the span of a second.

First, Seungwan widened her eyes threateningly, flicking them towards Joohyun for a second and then back to Seulgi, as if to say “There is nothing between us and if you even mention the possibility I will make sure terrible things happen to you”.

Fear flashed through Seulgi’s eyes before she was nodding almost imperceptibly, accepting to drop the topic. Still, she quirked a single eyebrow, clearly asking “And what about your feelings for her?”. Her gaze rested on Seungwan’s hand, still close to Joohyun’s, possibly a little closer. Had Joohyun shifted her hand? Seungwan was pretty sure her own hadn’t moved.

She shrugged off the guilt that had come creeping in at Seulgi’s very apt question and rolled her eyes with furrowed borrows. “There are no feelings. The feelings are all in the past. Stop asking dumb questions”, the eyeroll clearly insisted, hopefully not looking as defensive as she felt. Seulgi didn’t appear entirely convinced, but that was all they managed to communicate before the silent pause became too long.

“Are we what?”, Joohyun asked, a little puzzled, snapping the best friends out of their silent conversation. Seungwan nearly jumped in her seat, but Joohyun didn’t seem to have caught on to them.

“Are you hungry?”, Seulgi concluded smoothly, smacking both palms on the tabletop. “Because I am! So I’ll go get a slice of cake or something”, she added, getting up as she spoke. “Do you girls want anything?” Both Joohyun and Seungwan shook their heads, so she walked off to join the line by the register.

“That went well”, Seungwan commented encouragingly, letting her fingers curl around her still-warm cup of coffee, only partly to avoid the temptation that was Joohyun’s hand resting right by hers. “How do you feel?”

Joohyun flashed her a half-smile, tilting her head to the side. “Really relieved? And, uh, not sure what to do next, to be honest”, she admitted with a chuckle. She turned to study Seulgi’s back thoughtfully. Seungwan was about to assure her that she didn’t have to do anything else, but she was cut short by Joohyun’s next question. “Was Seulgi-yah your crush?”, she asked, nearly throwing her into a choking fit.

“What?”, she immediately yelped, so loudly that half the people in the room turned to her, including Seulgi. She fell silent under the sudden judgment, face reddening at the unwanted attention, and she and Joohyun simply sipped their drinks as casually as they could manage until the shop’s patrons returned to their own conversations. “It definitely wasn’t Seulgi-yah”, she denied in a whisper, cheeks still warm.

It wasn’t a completely unexpected question. Joohyun had already inquired after her crush many times, although she’d always brushed it off with assurances that it didn’t matter and that it was in the past anyway. It didn’t deter Joohyun, of course, since she seemed determined to find out as much as possible about Seungwan’s crush, and presumably crushes in general. She really was too curious for Seungwan’s good.

“Oh, sorry. I just thought, since you were always so close”, Joohyun justified herself, looking more amused than chastised by Seungwan’s explosive reaction. “And you’d get so red when I walked in on you two cuddling”, she added with a smirk.

“Not because of her”, Seungwan replied defensively, still a little high-strung. She swirled the remaining coffee around in her cup, the self-consciousness she’d felt at the time returning to her, at least in part. “It was just, I don’t know, kind of embarrassing to be doing all that skinship. I didn’t want to be some kid that needed to cling to her best friend like that”, she confessed reluctantly.

Joohyun’s smirk grew, equal parts endeared and playful. “So you were embarrassed because of me”, she stated more than asked, laughing at Seungwan’s shocked expression. “You didn’t want to look childish in front of a cool high-schooler”, she added teasingly, leaning closer to bump against Seungwan’s shoulder, which caught her completely off-balance and nearly threw her off her seat despite the utter lack of force behind it.

“You know, that’s a funny thing about growing up”, Joohyun added with a conspiratorial smile that Seungwan truly didn’t trust. “At some point, you stop caring so much about not looking like a kid”, she concluded as she turned to Seungwan more fully and smirked.

“No, no, no”, she hurriedly uttered, shuffling back in her seat but still unable to avoid Joohyun’s grasping hands, which latched around her arm and pulled her close.

“Yes, yes, yes”, Joohyun replied with good humour, letting her head fall on Seungwan’s shoulder with a playful wiggle. “You should have said you liked skinship, Seungwan-ah. Who cares about what’s childish if it makes you happy?”, she questioned with a little shrug that pulled Seungwan’s arm along.

Joohyun couldn’t know that skinship with her felt nothing like skinship with Seulgi, of course. To her credit, Seungwan’s stomach barely flipped in place at the contact. Instead, it was more like a tingly happiness spread through her entire body, making her feel pleasantly warm. An urge, almost irresistible for an instant, to wrap her arms around Joohyun and bury her head against her chest, just disappear in her embrace for a moment.

It felt so dangerously comforting and safe, and yet she did nothing to pry Joohyun’s arms away. The older girl looked so happy, smiling against her shoulder, that she didn’t dare take that away from her. Of course, as soon as Seulgi returned to the table to find them wrapped close together, she was even less convinced than when she’d left. Seungwan would deal with that later.

(…)

Joohyun was acting strangely. She’d seem fine, talking and laughing as excitedly as ever, but without warning she’d become withdrawn and thoughtful, barely answering Seungwan’s questions. She also hadn’t backed down on her offer for more skinship, which was admittedly more of an imposition than a suggestion on her part, but occasionally she’d let her hand slip from Seungwan’s without explanation, not even acknowledging it, simply stepping away and out of Seungwan’s reach as casually as possible, then carrying on their conversation like nothing had happened.

And then she started excusing herself from their afternoons together. Not all of them, not even that many, but enough that Seungwan could tell it wasn’t just a coincidence, especially considering all the excuses she gave were intimately familiar to her. She was busy, she had a last-minute thing, she’d just remembered a project that she had to hand in the next day.

Joohyun was avoiding her. Slowly distancing herself from her. And she could understand why, of course. She’d probably only hung around this long because she felt grateful for Seungwan’s help going through her identity issues, but there was no point in maintaining a friendship out of guilt or gratitude. If Joohyun didn’t want to be her friend, Seungwan didn’t want her hanging around like it was some obligation, even if it did hurt a little. Or maybe a lot. It just felt unfair that, right as she’d found herself in a place where she could accept and value Joohyun’s friendship, she wasn’t even allowed to have that.

She tried not to let it get to her, to keep treating Joohyun normally. The last thing she wanted was to go back to her high school self, throwing everything away for the older girl’s attention. If their friendship wasn’t going to work, then it simply wasn’t. In the meantime, Seungwan refused to jump through hoops in a pointless effort to try to divine where she’d gone wrong and how she could go right.

They lay side by side in her small single bed, chatting away the afternoon. She was on one side, back resting against the wall, and Joohyun on the other, scooted so close to the end of the bed that Seungwan wondered how she hadn’t fallen off yet. They were facing each other, mostly because Seungwan’s bed couldn’t fit two people on their backs unless they were tightly pressed together, and Joohyun rested her head on both hands while Seungwan let her own rest on the bedcovers, occasionally pulling at a loose thread.

“Anyway, it’s not like I actually believe that stuff”, she pointed out with a slight eyeroll as Joohyun smirked, not looking entirely convinced. “But it got to a point where all my friends were insisting I should date him because he’s a Taurus”, she concluded, laughing a bit at the ridiculous situation. She was retelling a particularly inconsequential episode of her dating history, all that was left now that she’d already shared all the major ones.

“Well, it’s true that they’re very compatible with Pisces”, Joohyun replied casually, looking so neutral that Seungwan couldn’t even tell whether she was joking. “So, did you end up dating him?”, she prodded, since Seungwan had fallen silent in her study of a particularly stubborn thread. She hadn’t even bothered with that part, since the answer seemed obvious enough to her.

“No”, she said with a snort, letting her eyes go back up to Joohyun’s, even if it did make it a little harder to concentrate. “He was a Taurus, but he was also kind of a dick, which definitely isn’t compatible with this particular Pisces”, she joked, feeling a little self-conscious at the anti-climactic conclusion. Well, she couldn’t make up a romance that hadn’t been there, could she?

Joohyun flashed her usual crooked grin, her eyes twinkling with amusement for a moment before they settled back to their usual peaceful and inscrutable state. Seungwan felt herself get lost in that captivating gaze until she wasn’t sure for how long she’d simply been looking into Joohyun’s eyes. She was only snapped out of her trance by Joohyun sitting up with a slight frown.

“Don’t you have class soon?”, she asked, and it was a fair enough question, but it still made Seungwan feel like Joohyun was trying to get rid of her once again.

She slowly rose, shifting so she was sitting by the top of the bed, back against the wall and knees hugged close to her chest. Checking her watch, she smiled guiltily. “More like thirty minutes ago”, she confessed with a little shrug.

Joohyun’s brow furrowed with bewildered indignation and Seungwan almost worried that she would smack her arm, considering how she looked exactly like an angry parent. “Seungwan-ah, you can’t keep doing that!”, she exclaimed with exasperation, only managing to confuse her.

“I don’t! It was only this one time”, she hurriedly defended herself against the unjustified accusation. “And it’s no big deal, the teacher is reviewing the test and I got an A anyway”, she added truthfully. The only reason she’d lost track of time in the first place was because she’d already decided not to go, or she would have paid closer attention.

“It’s not just that”, Joohyun insisted, frustration barely abated by Seungwan’s explanation. She turned to rest her legs on the floor, facing away from Seungwan. “You have to stop acting like this. Like I’m your only priority”, she explained in a lowered voice. Her face was covered by a curtain of hair, so Seungwan couldn’t see what she looked like, whether she was sad, tired or just pitying.

So it had actually come to a direct confrontation. She’d expected Joohyun to simply slip away from her little by little, but clearly she’d been wrong. Even though she knew she was being wrongfully accused, that she’d tried so hard to make sure she didn’t throw everything else away for Joohyun, her first instinct was still to justify herself. Really, she should have tried to get the upper hand for once. Just once, before it was all over.

“It’s not like that”, she said, sounding embarrassingly meek. Joohyun still wouldn’t look at her and she balled her hands into fists at the feeling of impotence lodging itself painfully in her throat. “I mean, we’re friends, aren’t we? Friends are there for each other”

“I know. Trust me, I know”, Joohyun repeated tensely. Her face was still hidden from view, but Seungwan could see her hands, how they were pushing tightly against her knees as her whole body seemed to heave with a deep inhale. “That’s why I feel so ungrateful. That I don’t want your friendship”

It was hurtful. It was more than hurtful. But it was also strange. Joohyun wouldn’t do this to her, she wouldn’t be this cruel and thoughtless. She wouldn’t throw away their relationship like this, like it had been some magnanimous gesture on her part to even associate with Seungwan. But if it wasn’t that, could it really be…

“When I met you, you were this kid that looked up to me”, Joohyun spoke up, breaking Seungwan’s confused line of thought. She could only listen, heart suddenly beating in an erratic pattern. “And now it feels like you grew up so much and I’m just stuck. I’m still that insecure high school student, I have no idea what I’m doing. God, you must really pity me”

Seungwan wanted to say something, to reach out and lay a comforting hand on Joohyun’s hunched shoulder, but she was frozen, her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. She could only watch as the older girl finally let out whatever had been stuck inside her. Whatever had had her acting so strange lately.

“You don’t even… You don’t even realize what you’re doing, do you?” Joohyun’s back was still turned to her and she desperately wished she could see her face, see what emotions were flitting through it. The rhythm of her heart only accelerated until she was sure it would shoot right out of her chest.

“I tried to pull away, to put some distance between us, but I’m not even strong enough for that”, Joohyun confessed bitterly. “I don’t want this, to lose the only person I really care about, but I can’t – I just – I can’t stop falling for you”, she whispered in a shaky voice, just as her whole frame began to tremble as well. “I’m sorry, Seungwan-ah, I’m really sorry”

“Please don’t be sorry”, she finally managed to say, the shock at Joohyun’s confession wearing off as it was replaced by concern for the girl who seemed close to tears. She reached forward timidly, hand wrapping around Joohyun’s elbow to turn her around, but the older girl surprised her by turning to face her without prompting, eyes glistening and mouth set in a grim frown.

“Why not?”, she asked defiantly, confusion and hurt seeming to emerge as anger, although Seungwan knew very well that it wasn’t aimed at her, but rather at Joohyun herself.

“Because”, she mumbled, mouth suddenly numb and far too graceless to formulate everything she was thinking and feeling. Instead, she let her fingers grip tighter around Joohyun’s elbow, steadying her as she leaned forward to rest her free hand on the older girl’s cheek. Her thumb brushed gently against the soft skin, willing the tears not to drop quite yet. She leaned a bit closer, almost smiling at the way Joohyun’s eyes widened even as her lips parted and her breath came a little faster.

She shut her eyes and closed the short distance still remaining between them, pressing her lips against Joohyun’s so softly that she wondered if the older girl could even feel it. All she knew was that she definitely did, every instant of it, every millimetre of Joohyun’s skin on hers. She could feel the utter softness of Joohyun’s lips, the way she kissed back at once, with no hesitation, the sigh that disturbed the air between them, though she wasn’t sure which one of them had breathed it out, not when she could barely remember where she was.

When she pulled back, she felt like everything inside her was exploding, yet she felt more calm and secure than she had in years. She couldn’t help the bright smile that forced itself on her face, though it seemed that Joohyun was in a similar predicament. “Do you remember Jupiter crashing into the Earth?”, she asked the older girl, hand still on her cheek, keeping their faces so close that their noses were brushing together. Joohyun nodded weakly, eyes seeming to look right through her. “I was right”, she whispered against her lips.

Joohyun’s eyes finally seemed to clear and she brought her own hand up to rest over Seungwan’s. “I want to ask questions”, she began with unexpected joy, given how she’d sounded so close to tears just a moment ago. “But I also want to kiss you again”, she added mischievously. Something twinkled in her eyes, something excited and almost hungry, and Seungwan was surprised by the sudden fear settling in her chest.

“Maybe the questions first?”, she suggested weakly, moving away from Joohyun gracelessly and unable to miss the flash of disappointment that passed through her face.

Joohyun pouted at Seungwan’s words and it was impressive how tempted Seungwan was to throw all caution to the wind and grant the older girl’s wish. Still, she held her ground and refused to come any closer. “Why?”, Joohyun asked petulantly, offering Seungwan her most encouraging smirk.

“Because… what if you don’t want to kiss me anymore, after the questions?”, she admitted shyly, looking down at the bedsheets in a distracted search for that loose thread from earlier. Joohyun’s hand tightened over hers, coaxing her to look back up, where she found that the older girl’s face had softened, her touch impossibly gentle as she pulled Seungwan’s hand away from her cheek to link their fingers together.

“Seungwan-ah”, she called cautiously, and her name had never sounded so sweet coming from Joohyun’s lips. Like she was already hers. The thought had her heart flipping in place and her fingers tightening against Joohyun’s. “Was I your crush?”, the older girl asked in a low voice, like she was afraid she’d scare her away.

Seungwan nodded slowly, wishing Joohyun weren’t quite so close, looking straight into her face as all her vulnerability and embarrassment emerged in full force. She tried to look away, but Joohyun tightened her grip to call her eyes back up to her. “Is that why you stopped coming to see me?”

She nodded again, fingers tightening and loosening against Joohyun’s with no particular purpose other than the need to be in control of at least something. “I’m sorry, Seungwan-ah, I should have realized”, Joohyun said sadly, those hypnotizing eyes still fixed squarely on Seungwan’s as they tried to convey the full weight of her apology.

She shrugged like she wished she could shrug off their shared past. “It’s okay, I mean, you knowing wouldn’t have changed anything”, she pointed out, and Joohyun finally let her look away. She wanted to say it, but she didn’t. That it would have been better if Joohyun had never realized at all. She didn’t want to bring up something else for the older girl to regret.

“So, do you… Is that too much baggage for you?”, Joohyun asked hesitantly, grip becoming loose until their hands were simply resting on top of each other. Until Seungwan could pull away without resistance, if she wanted to. She didn’t. But it wasn’t that simple, was it?

“It’s not that, it’s just…”, she began, not sure how to explain what she felt, the doubts that nibbled at the base of her heart, right where the happiness would be if she said yes to this, to Joohyun. “This is new for you, liking girls and accepting that you like girls, and I’m the only girl you know that… I don’t know if we should… I’m coming into this with a lot of, uh, expectations, I guess? I have a lot to lose and maybe that’s not the ideal, you know, first experience for you”

She wasn’t sure why she suddenly had the vocabulary and communication skills of a third grader, but Joohyun seemed to understand what she meant anyway, because her posture changed from reluctantly accommodating to defiant in an instant. “You think I’m interested in being with someone and not necessarily you?”

She didn’t need to nod, so she just gave their joined hands a little squeeze, which was enough for Joohyun’s grip to grow steady once again. “Well, I’m not sure how to prove that that’s not the case”, the older girl pointed out, not sounding angry or even sad, but more like she was eager to take up the challenge. “But I know it isn’t”, she added with such certainty that Seungwan couldn’t help but look back up, wondering if she could see the spark of truth in her eyes that would finally clear her questions.

Joohyun smiled at her, smiled like she knew some secret she didn’t. “I fell for you because of who you are. Because you always know just what to say to make me feel better. Because it’s so easy to get you riled up. Because of every single one of your smiles, even the one you just put on because you’re uncomfortable and you don’t know what else to do” She brought Seungwan’s hand up to her lips and kissed the inside of her wrist, slowly spreading her fingers so that Seungwan was cupping her cheek once more. “Because you’re so confident”, she added with a tender smile.

Seungwan really couldn’t help the laugh that escaped her at that. Confident? Her amusement caused Joohyun’s brow to furrow petulantly, a cute little pout shaping her lips for an instant before her determination returned. “You might not realize it, but you really are. Even if things were hard, you’ve never questioned who you were. I mean, you fell for a girl and that was it. That was you, and you just accepted it, and you never tried to change it or… I don’t know, ‘fix’ it”, she said with a small shrug. Seungwan didn’t like the meaning behind Joohyun’s phrasing, but she didn’t try to interrupt her, not when her heart felt like a little nutshell in stormy waters, liable to capsize at any moment.

“You’re really, really brave, Seungwan-ah. You make me feel like I can be brave too” And there it was. The little nutshell was lost, slowly sinking to the bottom of the ocean. She couldn’t help the way her thumb brushed against Joohyun’s cheek, the way her eyes slid down to Joohyun’s lips. Honestly, it was already a miracle that she hadn’t simply kissed her into silence.

The smile on Joohyun’s face told her that the older girl was well aware of her victory. Not that she looked gloating. It was more like she’d reached out to touch the distant moon and suddenly found herself holding it, its dazzling beauty stunning her into awed silence. It made Seungwan’s heart return from the depths to jump straight into her throat.

“So, what does this make us?”, Joohyun asked, breaking the dazed silence that had settled between them as neither girl moved nor spoke. “Are we, like… You know”, she added awkwardly. Seungwan gazed at her expectantly while the older girl grew unexpectedly shy. “Please don’t make me say it”, she said with a grimace, fingers tightening nervously over Seungwan’s.

“I, uh, I need you to say it”, she admitted, the last of her vulnerability coming out in full force. Apparently, it was all the prodding Joohyun needed, because she only nodded solemnly, swallowing down her uncertainty.

“Seungwan-ah, do you, uh, do you want to be my girlfriend?”, she requested with the blank face that she usually adopted when overtaken by nerves.

“Yes”, Seungwan managed to reply around the knot that had somehow formed itself in her throat, barely letting her breathe with the most confusing mixture of happiness, breathlessness and an inexplicable urge to cry. She felt like she was breathing out years of pain and frustration in that single, tiny word. She felt like she was starting over.

Joohyun pulled down her hand to study it in her lap, weakly pulling at her fingers. “So, is there anything else you wanted to talk about?”, she asked casually, looking up to gauge Seungwan’s reaction. She shook her head a little curiously, but the smirk on Joohyun’s face answered her easily enough. This time it was her stomach that began to flip and spasm. “Okay, good”, the older girl commented, before surging forward, only pausing an inch away from Seungwan’s mouth. She looked suddenly uncertain, readjusting her angle as her eyes fell to Seungwan’s lips, then pressed on until they were kissing.

This time, Joohyun was fully in control of the kiss, and it was like she wanted to pack all the kisses in the world into this one moment. Her lips moved eagerly against Seungwan’s, her hand already wrapped behind her neck even though Seungwan couldn’t remember it ever travelling there. “I’ve wanted to kiss you so many times”, she admitted, hot breath on Seungwan’s sensitive skin, leaning in for more as soon as those few words had been said.

Seungwan tried to pull back to say something, but Joohyun followed her stubbornly, not letting their mouths detach. “What”, she managed to mumble against the older girl, the word muffled but still distinguishable. Joohyun only chuckled, humming in confirmation as her free hand fell to Seungwan’s waist and gripped the fabric tightly.

“When you bite your lips”, she said simply, letting her teeth scrape against Seungwan’s bottom lip to exemplify, so that it took her a good few seconds to even understand what had been said. “When I fix your bangs and you almost go cross-eyed trying to follow my finger”, she let out in a rush, trying to minimize the time between kisses while sharing this absolutely essential information. This time, it was her tongue that ran across Seungwan’s lip, causing her to let out something halfway between a gasp and a whine as her mouth fell open of its own accord.

“When you smile so hard you get that little dimple”, Joohyun concluded, and Seungwan knew that she’d concluded because that was when her tongue brushed past her lips and into her mouth and God, if their first kiss had been Jupiter crashing into the Earth, then she didn’t even know what this one was. Possibly jumping straight into the Sun, judging by how her entire body was burning up, heat radiating from that spot in her waist where Joohyun’s fingers were digging into her through two or three layers of fabric.

She didn’t even know what she was thinking anymore, mind buzzing from Joohyun’s words and Joohyun’s touches and Joohyun’s tongue and somehow she was on her back now, Joohyun on top of her as they continued to kiss. Her grip on reality only grew weaker, but she definitely wasn’t complaining. This was so far from a problem that it became the very opposite of a problem. It felt like the answers to every issue she’d ever had were hiding somewhere in Joohyun’s lips, if only she kept searching.

She felt like she was going crazy. But such a good kind of crazy.

(…)

She scooted a little closer to the heater, hiding her hands in little sweater paws as she watched Joohyun flit through her room, trying in vain to put some order in the mess that she’d made of it. They were supposed to be packing up Seungwan’s things for the move to her new dorm room next year, but she was feeling lazy and she wanted Joohyun to come be lazy with her.

“So, only one more year until you graduate”, she remarked casually, mostly so Joohyun would turn around and look at her. She did, an endeared smile springing to her lips at the size of the ridiculously oversized sweater, just as planned. Seungwan smiled in return, stretching out her sweater-pawed hands to call Joohyun over to her side.

The older girl obeyed easily, coming to sit next to her on Seungwan’s bed. They spent most of their time at college in one of their rooms, enjoying the privacy it allowed them. It didn’t make them the most sociable pair on campus, but it was worth it for the comfort of knowing they could pause what they were doing at any time to brush strands of hair behind an ear or steal a kiss on the cheek without fear of judgment.

Seulgi was the only exception. They'd told her right away and she'd been nothing but happy for them, enveloping the two in a tight hug as she sniffled out her congratulations. Somehow, the whole thing had only made them grow closer and now the three spent as much time together as they could, meeting for coffee, to chat or even just to study. It made Seungwan realize how much she'd missed being with her best friend.

“We should do something to celebrate”, she carried on once Joohyun was comfortably settled by her side, hands immediately snaking around Seungwan’s arm as if by instinct. “Maybe we could go on a trip”, she mused aloud, encouraged by Joohyun’s responding hum. “Let’s go to Europe”, she added excitedly, causing Joohyun to pull back so she could study her with a raised brow.

“To Europe?”, she asked doubtfully. “Sure, let me just call up my private jet”, she added sarcastically, pretending to rummage in her pocket for her phone.

“Fine, fine, a bit too expensive for our first trip together”, Seungwan conceded easily. “I can understand why you wouldn’t want to spend too much money. After all, I’m only your beloved girlfriend, one and only in the world”, she pointed out playfully, not even complaining when Joohyun poked her side in retaliation.

“But we should go sometime. I hear it’s nice there”, she continued. She reached for Joohyun’s hand, ostensibly to stop her attack on her ribs, but mostly just to hold it. “You know, two women can get married there”, she said dreamily. It seemed like a strange notion, but it wasn’t like marrying Joohyun would be the worst thing in the world.

Joohyun laughed at her words, reaching out with her free hand for another round of poking, until Seungwan was forced to grasp both of her hands tightly with the look of an exasperated adult taking care of a child. “That is the weakest proposal I’ve ever heard”, the older girl quipped, struggling for a bit to release her hands but then relaxing in contented defeat.

“Are you saying it wouldn’t work?”, she immediately questioned with a smirk that quickly dissolved into giggling as Joohyun looked away with a slight blush. “You’re so easy”, she pointed out as she leaned closer to press a kiss to Joohyun’s reddened cheek.

They sat holding hands for a moment, similarly goofy smiles on both of their faces. “The wife takes the husband’s last name in Europe, right?”, Joohyun commented lightly, swinging their hands from side to side. “How does that work with two women?”

“They both take each other’s name”, Seungwan deadpanned, earning a sceptical chuckle from her girlfriend.

“I’m pretty sure the point of the ritual is to have both spouses share a last name”, she pointed out with amusement. Seungwan leaned in to kiss her, because she looked pretty and she was her girlfriend and she could just do that if she wanted to.

“I guess they pick one of them?”, she offered uncertainly. She had an inkling that the process wasn’t mandatory, but she was having fun discussing it, so she didn’t point that out. “How does that sound? Mrs. Son Joohyun”, she suggested with laughter that didn’t abate at all when Joohyun’s face twisted in displeasure.

“It sounds bad”, she replied with hardly any bite behind her words. She breathed in thoughtfully. “Mrs. Bae Seungwan, on the other hand…”, she trailed off, one corner of her lips quirking up to give her the usual crooked smile.

Seungwan gasped in dramatic outrage. “You’d take away the beautiful alliteration in my name?”

“You’d still have plenty of beautiful things left”, Joohyun remarked smoothly, one hand releasing Seungwan’s to fix her bangs before settling behind her neck, playing with the small hairs in her nape.

It took a bit of effort, but Seungwan schooled her face into a look of youthful enthusiasm, instead of giving up their playful back and forth and simply melting on the spot. “Like my beautiful wife?”, she asked in just the right tone to make Joohyun roll her eyes in flattered frustration.

“No”, the older girl said drily. “Like your beautiful face. And your beautiful eyes”, she enumerated in a tone that was far too sweet for her own good. “Your beautiful lips”, she added as an afterthought, gaze falling on them with definite interest.

“Careful there, Mrs. Son”, Seungwan cautioned in a tone that was far from discouraging. “You’re travelling from sweet and supportive to dangerously flirtatious”, she informed the older girl, who only smirked without letting her eyes move from her mouth.

“Am I, Mrs. Bae? And if I keep travelling?”, she asked in a low voice that did wonderful things to Seungwan’s insides. Joohyun was definitely leaning forward, although it was slow enough to go unnoticed for anyone not paying quite as much attention as Seungwan.

“You’ll land on downright seductive”, she said simply. Her grin was wiped off her face as Joohyun only kept moving, shifting to straddle her waist before she was placing her hands on each side of her face and pulling her in for a kiss.

They were interrupted by a knock on the door and Seungwan only took in a frustrated breath, gently moving Joohyun off of her lap so she could get up and check on their intruder, whom she jokingly insisted better be dead or dying. Maybe not entirely jokingly.

She changed her mind about the dying thing when she cracked the door open to find her sister. “Seunghee-unnie? What are you doing here?”, she asked in genuine surprise. They still saw each other at the family dinners that both sisters made an effort to attend, but this was the first time Seunghee had come to visit her at school.

“Wow, don’t welcome me so warmly, I might never want to leave”, her sister deadpanned, an eyebrow raised in disapproval, which Seungwan didn’t bother to challenge. She looked over Seungwan’s shoulder, finally noticing the presence of someone else in the room. “Oh, Joohyun-ssi”, she greeted warmly. “I didn’t know you two were still friends”

Joohyun nearly jumped in place. She immediately bent in an almost 90-degree bow which had both sisters studying her with confusion. “Hello, Seunghee-ssi”, she said, looking a little pale as she straightened up.

Seunghee offered a polite bow in return, but her attention seemed to remain on Joohyun and her strange behaviour, so Seungwan cleared her throat before things got too awkward. “So, why were you here again?”, she requested once more, succeeding in recovering her sister’s attention.

“Oh, right. I have a big deadline coming up at work and I’ll probably spend the next couple of weeks living in my office. That means I’ll miss your birthday, so I thought I could come by and we’d celebrate early”, she explained with a smile.

It was actually really nice of her, and Seungwan was thankful that she’d made the time to visit her. But she was still her older sister, so she couldn’t just say that. “And you couldn’t have called? I could have been busy today”, she said instead, groaning as her sister reached out to ruffle her hair in response.

“If I called, you could weasel your way out of it. This way I don’t give you any choice”, she pointed out with a smirk. “Come on, I’ll treat you to dinner. Just not at the cafeteria, please. And until dinner time, we could talk in the lounge or something. Tell me what you’ve been up to”, she offered happily. Her eyes left Seungwan for a second, studying the flustered girl still standing by the bed. “Joohyun-ssi, you can come too, if you want”

On their way through corridors and down stairs, Seunghee received a work call, leaving Seungwan and Joohyun behind to talk in hushed voices. “What was that?”, Seungwan asked with poorly-concealed amusement. They were just far enough apart that their hands wouldn’t brush as they walked, an imposition on Joohyun’s part that was particularly pointless when she’d clung to her arm well before they’d been dating.

“She’s your sister”, Joohyun pointed out with wide eyes, like that said everything. It clearly didn’t, and Seungwan tried to signal that as she furrowed her brow in confusion. “What if she figures it out? What if she hates me? She’ll think I corrupted her little sister”, she gasped out in horror.

“Well, I mean…”, Seungwan said suggestively, and Joohyun wasted no time in smacking her arm. She knew she should take Joohyun more seriously, but seeing the older girl look so uneasy was an unexpected reminder that Joohyun was just as insecure as her, just another person trying to figure things out. “Look, relax, it’s just my sister. She won’t notice anything, as long as we don’t act too suspicious. It’ll be fine, you just have to calm down a little”, she tried, as reassuring as she could manage.

Joohyun didn’t look reassured at all, so Seungwan reached for her arm, ignoring her protests. “Hyun-ah”, she began gently, but Joohyun interrupted her with a scandalized gasp at the formalities they’d grown used to dropping in private. “Unnie”, she tried again, which soothed the older girl at least a little. “Nobody noticed we’re together and even before that, nobody noticed you liked me, right? So she won’t notice anything either, it’s fine, I promise”

Joohyun took a deep breath, and although it was a bit shaky, she still looked slightly better after the exhale. She nodded, allowing Seungwan to keep her grip on her arm even when Seunghee finished her call and returned to their side.

Sitting on the lounge with her sister and Joohyun, it was strange how much it felt like she’d travelled back in time, even stranger to think of all the ways the three of them had changed in just a couple of years. Their conversation flowed unexpectedly easily, with Seungwan serving as mediator, a role that she was more than happy to take. Even though she’d told Joohyun that it was only her sister, she couldn’t deny that she was pleased to see Seunghee get along so easily with her girlfriend.

“Joohyun-ah”, Seunghee said, already treating her more casually, but still enforcing the full authority she had as the oldest in the group. “Would you mind getting us some coffee? It’d give me and my little mouse some sisterly time”, she explained, pinching Seungwan’s cheek as the youngest simply sighed in defeat. Joohyun had better not pick up that particular nickname.

Joohyun got up without hesitation, heading to the long line in front of the coffee machine. Despite how bad the coffee actually was, all the students seemed to flock to it. As soon as she was out of earshot, Seunghee began to speak, eyes still on Joohyun’s receding back.

“Baby Seungwan-ah would have been so happy to know you were still close with your favourite unnie”, she commented with nostalgia, a little smile quirking up the corners of her mouth. “And high school Seungwan-ah too, I’d bet. After all, she was your favourite upperclassman, wasn’t she? And your favourite freshman. She was your favourite a lot of things”, she pointed out, turning to her with a smirk, and suddenly Seungwan could sympathize with Joohyun’s panic.

Oh well. There was no point in lying, not with Seunghee. She sighed, admitting the truth with a shrug. “Are we that obvious?”, she finally asked, a little worried.

“No, not at all”, Seunghee reassured her at once. “I mean, Joohyun-ah a little, but she was probably just nervous about me, right? But I’m your sister, of course I’d notice something like this”, she explained casually.

“I’m sorry”, Seungwan said in a low voice. “That I didn’t tell you anything. And, I guess, that I’m…”

“Dating a girl?”, her sister cut in with amusement. “Eh, it could be worse. You could still be dating that dick from your senior year. I swear, you only paid attention to him to give me an aneurysm”

Seungwan bumped into her in protest. “I never dated him, obviously. And please, like I’d ever do anything because of you”, she added contrarily, before stopping herself. Was it okay to joke around after her sister had just shrugged off her dating a girl like it was nothing? Maybe she should actually show some gratitude. She was about to, when Seunghee beat her to it.

“Anyway, I’m the one who should be apologizing”, she said, suddenly serious, and Seungwan was stumped. She blinked at her in confusion, but she was already carrying on. “I mean, I suspected it. You kept coming back and I never saw you with anyone but her. It wasn’t too hard to put two and two together”

Seunghee shrugged, still looking ahead. Still in her work clothes, she looked so much like a grownup. Like she could have kids of her own any day now. “I just thought, you know, I was so busy with finishing school and wondering if I was doing the right thing, I told myself if you wanted to talk, then you’d say something”

Seungwan raised a hand to Seunghee’s shoulder, not sure what else she could do to comfort her, to let her know that no apologies were necessary. “But you were my little sister, you shouldn’t have had to say something. If I knew something was wrong, I should have brought it up. Instead, I buried my head in the sand and pretended I didn’t notice. So I’m sorry for that”

It would be very embarrassing to cry in the middle of the crowded lounge, especially if it was because of something her older sister had said, but Seunghee didn’t look much better than her in that department, which was a little comforting. She took a steadying breath, squeezing her sister’s shoulder to say what her mouth couldn’t express quite yet.

“It’s okay, unnie”, she said once she was confident that she could speak. “Looking back, I think we were all dealing with a lot. And neither of us noticed anything but our own issues”, she commented, knowing that she didn’t just mean her and Seunghee. It had been exactly the same with Joohyun, and she had been at the centre, seeing them both but never really looking beyond the surface.

“It’s weird how older kids always look like they have so much more figured out than us”, Seungwan mused, more to herself than anything. “And then we grow up, and we’re the age they were when we looked up to them, and we feel exactly the same. Just as confused and messed up”

They fell silent, watching Joohyun slowly move up the line, coming closer and closer to the coffee machine. “Unnie?”, Seungwan asked. “Are you happy? I mean, is your job… Is it still something that you…”, she tried hesitantly, unsure how to word it.

“You know what? I actually like it”, Seunghee admitted with a chuckle. “It’s nothing like school and I’m working with a group that’s mostly people my age, so that’s nice. Obviously I’m not excited about that deadline, but for the most part I do like what I do”

“That’s good. I’m really glad”, Seungwan replied honestly. It was something she hadn’t done in years, but she let her hands wrap around Seunghee’s upper arm, pulling her in for a very awkward side hug. Both sisters began to laugh as soon as it was over, but she didn’t regret it.

“How about you?”, Seunghee asked. She furrowed her brow, wondering what she meant, but her sister was quick to clarify. “Are you happy?”

“Oh” She caught Joohyun’s eye as she moved up another spot and flashed her a bright smile, which the older girl returned before she could stop herself, freezing after a second and fixing her with a threatening glare that only made Seungwan smile harder. “Yeah. I think I am”

Her sister chuckled by her side, not a moment of the interaction lost, even if she pretended not to have noticed for Joohyun’s sake. “Happy birthday, Seungwan-ah”, she said softly. “What are you going to wish for this year?”

“I have no idea”, she confessed with a laugh. Seunghee smiled at her words, winking at Joohyun as the girl finally made her way back with their drinks. Sitting there, with her sister and her girlfriend, with the whole future ahead of her, she had no idea what else she could possibly want.

It felt like something was ending, something that had begun so long ago, something that she’d been carrying with her for years. But it also felt like something was beginning, and she couldn’t wait to find out what it would be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everybody. This story is very special to me and I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thank you for all the attention, all the kudos and comments, they all make me really happy and encourage me to keep writing. Come find me on twitter (@numot94) if you want :)


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